


Tag Galaxy: A Laser Tag Reylo Fic

by how_do_i_turn_this_thing_off



Series: Tag Galaxy: A Laser Tag Reylo Fic [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-01-04 06:07:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 28,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21192809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/how_do_i_turn_this_thing_off/pseuds/how_do_i_turn_this_thing_off
Summary: Modern AU where Ben is the record-holder at laser tag and then Rey comes and owns his assFic prompt originally posted by @reyloday on Tumblr; meant to respond with a oneshot, now we here.  Exactly the same as what happened with 'The Rebel's Last Stand', my other Reylo series *heavy sigh*  BUT it means more fic goodness for you!!  So enjoy :)As always, all the Reylo stuff I write is originally posted to my tumblr, then to here; to get it fresh and hot, here's the link for my blog:https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/





	1. New spaces, old faces

Tag Galaxy’s new location had been easier to memorize than Ben had expected, despite how large it was. Of course it wasn’t as though he was down on the Level 1 – 15 courses with the children’s birthday parties and the teenage casuals, giddily showing each other how their teeth glowed in the blacklight then screaming when they got picked off. He might cruise through every now and again if he was bored enough but it was hardly worth his time. Level 16 was pro’s only, the biggest, most complex, most challenging laser tag course ever made, and that was the corner of Tag Galaxy that Ben ruled completely.

He strode through the glass-fronted entrance from the mall outside, glancing at the sleek welcome desk, the black velvet rope separating the guests and members check-in kiosks, and the large screens mounted facing the door. There were five, with the two on each side cycling between cam footage of the games going on at the moment and advertisements, and the one in the middle listing the current daily and legacy rankings. His team, First Order, still had a commanding legacy lead over the nearest competitors, and among single player legacy scores his tag name stood out in the number one spot in bold red type: KYLO REN.

“Hey, Ren!” the member’s-side desk attendant greeted him as Ben approached, his voice oddly distorted through the laser tag mask he was wearing. Company policy made the Tag Galaxy employees dress in official white Tag Galaxy game gear to advertise it while they were on site, not that Ben or any of the other serious players would ever bother with that trash. Anyone who aspired to the top of the charts had custom gear and custom weapons. Behind his mask the attendant seemed to be grinning at him. “Hear about the new team we’ve got in?”

“No,” Ben said shortly, scanning his Membership ID.

“They’re called ‘The Rebellion’,” the attendant told him, giving the name generous air quotes. “One of those groups that got coupons off the online raffle, the ones who get free games every level until they're knocked out.”

“Is Hux in yet?” Ben asked, naming one of his First Order teammates and ignoring the attendant’s pointless gossip.

“Yeah, he always is,” the attendant said, annoyed to be interrupted but gesturing upwards vaguely to indicate Level 16. “Phasma’s kicking his ass.”

“Good,” Ben said, completely honestly. Phasma was his other teammate and had the second-highest single player score among them. She liked to 'train’ them herself time to time, which generally meant knocking Hux a few spots down in the rankings when his inferiority complex got the better of his mouth.

“But, Ren!” the attendant said insistently as he tried to turn away. “Look who’s on the team!” Ben bit back a growl, swinging around and staring at the roster the attendant was holding out toward him. Then he all but did a double-take. 

“Han?!” he spat, grabbing up the roster and staring at the first name. “That old asshole’s retired! Didn’t he get banned from the league?”

“I know, right?” the attendant said, clearly pleased to have finally gotten Ben’s attention. “We had to call upstairs and get the manager’s approval to let him in, but since he’s not the one who won the raffle we couldn’t refuse.”

If seeing Han’s name had been a shock, the next player listed all but made Ben’s blood boil. “I see Finn’s back.”

“Had to let him in, too,” the attendant said with what this time seemed almost like an apologetic shrug. “Raffle rules said you can bring up to two teammates and they can be anyone you want.” He was right to be bashful about it, and Ben treated him to a glare over the top of the sheet. Finn was an ex-employee who had been on the short list to join the First Order team, once upon a time. Phasma and Hux had both wasted untold hours training his ungrateful ass, recommending him to one of the mid-range teams, getting him a membership, congratulating each other as he went up the ranks. Even Ben had almost taken an interest in him, until Finn had thrown a tantrum over some 'unsportsmanlike conduct’ bullshit and turned his laser gun on his own teammates. He’d stormed out of Tag Galaxy swearing he’d never come back but they’d banned him too, just in case.

Ben tossed the roster back onto the desk, pointing to the third name: Rey. “Who the hell is he?” 

“It’s a girl,” the attendant corrected, putting the roster back in place among the other files. “She’s the one who won the raffle.”

“Won the raffle and dug up Han and Finn?” Ben replied sarcastically. “How?”

“Apparently she’s been hanging out with them over at Millennium Falcon,” the attendant said, avoiding his gaze, knowing what Ben’s response would be. And he got it, too– Ben, swore, repeatedly, wishing he had his laser gun in his hand just for the satisfaction of shooting at something, anything. Millennium Falcon. Even hearing the name was like he’d gotten a whiff of a bad smell he couldn’t get rid of. Ben wheeled around and stormed away from the desk, ignoring the shocked looks of the people who had been checking in on the guest side, retreating into the maze of halls at Tag Galaxy’s heart and shoving open the door to the member’s locker room so hard it bounced off the wall.

It was almost like a practical joke. For a moment he nearly suspected Hux was behind it, but Hux didn’t have an ounce of humor in him. Ben blew past the other lockers, ignoring the few members who were there- fortunately they were regulars and knew better than to bother him- going down to the power station cages next to the Levels entrance and staring at the screens mounted above the dual sets of elevator doors. It was the same setup as the ones up front, one screen for rankings and four for cameras and commercials, and he searched the feeds, examining the ongoing games for a glimpse of either of the people he might recognize.

Han and Finn. Han and Finn, who had apparently teamed up at Millennium Falcon. He bit back another volley of indiscriminate swearing, hands curling into fists. Millennium Falcon was a rival tag company Han owned, a cheap, slipshod outdoor operation that used to be able to compete with Tag Galaxy. Ben had trained there when he had first started getting into the sport, while the Falcon was already going steeply downhill and Tag Galaxy was on the rise. Fortunately he’d gotten out years ago and managed to earn a spot with some actual pro’s, but every so often Hux would sneer about 'how far he’d come’ and how much Ben must 'appreciate the opportunities he’d had’, and it pissed him off to the point where he regularly fantasized about shooting Hux in the back some time, just once, even if it did ding his score.

There. He squinted at what he was sure was Han’s pixelated outline, wearing the same grimy vest he always wore, a laser gun in his hand that was so antiquated it was amazing it still fired. He was down on Level 7, still well within the casual courses.

The feed cycled to a cartoon advising him to buy a milkshake at the concessions stand between games and this time Ben did swear out loud, looking for Level 7 on the other screens. When he found it again Finn was on the feed too, though Ben only knew him by his approximate size and how he aligned himself with Han, taking out other players with deadly accuracy. Ben glanced at the rankings and saw what he should have noticed before: Han and Finn were both listed in the single player category for today’s personal best, Han in the 26th slot, Finn in the 19th.

But the girl- Rey- was currently ranked 9th.

Ben stared, taking in the glowing light blue capitals of her tag name, trying to comprehend what he was seeing. No one just walked onto the Tag Galaxy courses and got into the Top 10 daily rankings, certainly not some wannabe fresh from the dusty corners of a disintegrating rustheap out in the middle of nowhere. Her searched the screens for her, scanning face after face as Level 7 cycled through the other feeds, trying to pick out which one she was.

The elevator door dinged in front of him and Hux stormed out, his skin sallow with rage against his red hair, his posture so alarmingly erect and precise Ben would have known with just one glance how badly he’d been beaten even without the desk attendant warning him beforehand. Hux froze for a moment when he realized Ben was there then turned abruptly, staring up at the screens too as though that was what he’d meant to do all along.

“You’ve dropped down to sixth,” Ben observed, scanning the legacy rankings. “What did she do, hold you down and shoot you a dozen times?”

“She took me up to Starkiller and reminded me how fortunate we are to have her on our team,” Hux said stiffly, referencing the sudden-death dueling range up on the top floor that had earned its nickname after hosting the disgrace of many a professional player. “You’ve seen that 'The Rebellion’ has joined us?”

“Level 7,” Ben replied, gesturing to the screen. “The traitor’s with them.” Hux narrowed his eyes at Finn’s image but said nothing. “Who’s the girl?” Ben wondered aloud, still searching for her among the few players that were left. 

“A nobody. Scum,” Hux said scathingly, some of the color coming back into his face. It always improved his mood to sneer at others. “If she’s on a team with those shitty has-beens it’s a wonder she’s even made it through the day.” He glanced at Ben, scanning him suspiciously. “Did you just get here?” 

“Yes,” Ben admitted, looking away as though he was examining the power cages, knowing what was coming. First Order team members were supposed to train for at least four rounds every day but he rarely if ever put his full hours in. Why should he? It wasn’t like he was going to get kicked off the team with the best legacy score in Tag Galaxy.

“Sometimes I wonder if you know the word 'discipline’," Hux said after a heavy silence.

“I don’t feel like I’ve missed anything. I’ve seen Phasma hand you your ass before.”

The blow landed; out of the corner of his eye he saw Hux’s jaw tighten. “Well, here’s your chance to make up the lost time,” he said, nodding toward the screens. Ben glanced up and saw the Level 7 game had finished, the final scores listed with the three Rebels at the top by a generous margin. “Suit up and get down to 8,” Hux said. “Grab a couple troopers if it’s a team round but take them out before they get any further. I don’t like seeing that filth on our screens.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Ben said shortly, turning towards his locker. Hux liked to order him around whenever he thought he could get away with it but today Ben was secretly relieved to have the excuse to go confront the Rebels himself. He’d been toying with the idea since seeing the names in the rankings–- if he was being honest about it, especially since seeing her name break Top 10 in the rankings. As he changed into his gear he reflected that it might not be a bad idea to hang back for a moment and watch how she did it. Hux and Phasma were always on him to keep his eyes open for competition and new recruits both, and he wondered idly if the girl would fall into either of those categories. Probably not. Far more likely that she was gaming the system, or that she was some obscure pro player from another, smaller company that Han and Finn had sought out to help them teach Tag Galaxy a lesson.

Ben smiled grimly to himself at that idea, donning his face mask and going to his power cage to pick up his weapon. He’d made his laser gun himself, modifying it so that it was more like a laser shotgun, shooting a tight cluster of randomly spaced simultaneous shots. It had been the pro weapon of choice years ago but had fallen out of favor due to the high risk of not all the shots hitting, which could tank your score if you weren’t careful. But if your aim hit the chest dead center every time, as Ben’s did, there was room for all the shots, and you could bump your legacy score up way past what anyone from a disgrace like the Falcon could ever hope to achieve. He examined it carefully for a moment to make sure it was fully charged, then closed and locked his cage to make sure it would still be open when he got back. You weren’t supposed to- the technical, derogatory term was 'cage hogging’- but again, who was going to stop him?

He had just enough time before going up to 8 to call the front desk on the concierge phone and see if 8 was setting up for a team tournament or a singles tournament. It was team only so he requested a couple of troopers, spare employees who were on hand to fill in when members or guests needed extra bodies in exactly this kind of situation. He’d rarely seen a trooper manage to hit anything smaller than an elephant’s ass but they were a formality; he could easily have handled 8 by himself, if it had been allowed.

Before leaving the locker room he checked the rankings one more time. The dailies had adjusted to account for the final game scores from 7 and Han was now at 24th, Finn still at 19th but only by a couple of points. The girl held steady at 9th. Ben hoisted his weapon and punched in 8 on the elevators, already working out how he’d handle things. There’d be fifty or sixty people at least on a Level 8 game, all tripping over each other while causing absolute bedlam, and he could burn through them if he needed to without too much effort. The Rebels were probably the only noteworthy people there to start with, and that by raffle-generated random chance. All in all, it was unlikely to take up more than a few moments of his time.


	2. Meeting the Rebels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben heads to 8 to take out the new Rebel team making waves at Tag Galaxy; it doesn't quite go to plan

He got to 8 just a few moments after the game had started, as intended; a Member could join any time within the first five minutes if they’d called ahead. His two troopers were waiting for him off to one side and both visibly straightened up when he came out of the elevator, though thankfully their company masks hid their expressions.

“It’s an honor, Kylo Ren,” one of them said, and they fell in behind them as he entered the darkened lobby, giving his eyes time to adjust. The racks of rental gear and weapons were empty, meaning the Level was at capacity for this game; it was going to be a slaughter.

“Is there anything you need from us?” the eager trooper asked, close on his heels.

“Stay out of my way,” Ben said, not bothering to sugar coat it as he hoisted his gun. He nodded to the room attendant, the door slid open, and they entered the darkened course.

Level 8 was populated with heavy concrete barriers and several randomly elevated ramps and nests where players could both snipe others from above and hold a position against attack. It was kept very dark and Ben used that to his advantage, staying against the wall so that his all-black gear would help him blend into the shadows. The troopers tried to follow but he waved them off impatiently; their bright white gear was a glaring liability. He made his way around the edge of the play area, killing anyone who got too close but not trying to make waves, since it wasn’t like his score needed the boost of the half-points he would get for killing players so much further down the legacy rankings than he was. A couple of the people he took out were semi-pro’s grinding in 8 to try and boost their score while they were still ranked low enough to get full points, and they recognized him when they died. Some swore at him furiously, waving their guns and threatening that they were going to file a complaint, while others instantly tried to leech off him, begging for an invite to a First Order training round. Ben ignored both kinds, shaking them off as he kept moving, scanning what he could see for Han or Finn. Laser guns blasted from all around, beams of colored light catching in some of the fake smoke that was pumped in at intervals from hidden vents around the room, players calling out to each other as they tried to run and fight and hide.

Finn. Ben caught a glimpse of him through the smoke, coming his way, and pushed against the wall to stay hidden. He was carrying an older handgun of the type generally for rent from the Falcon and striding purposefully along the open walkway with his head turned toward the action, not watching the shadows behind him. In his other hand he held a battered walkie-talkie and he seemed to be muttering observations in it, probably to the girl or to Han. Ben smiled grimly, lifting his gun and taking careful aim.

Pow. Ben glanced down reflexively as his chest plate lit up, several perfectly concentric circles of bright blue centered directly on his sensors, the gear turning bright red to indicate a fatal hit at close range. Very close range. Very, very close range.

“Hi,” the girl said, standing not a few inches from him, still barely visible in the smoke and the dark as she grinned widely, lowering the gun that a moment ago had been all but pressed against his chest when she’d fired. She was at least a foot shorter than he was, dressed in worn and hard-used gear that might have seen better days about a century ago, her dark hair pulled back into a bun under her face mask, her sunny expression open and entirely undaunted by his simultaneously stunned and aggravated glare.

“Kylo Ren,” Finn said, turning around to face them, hoisting his gun up to his shoulder with a smug grin as several strobe lights came on at random somewhere up above, lighting up the immediate area and playing bright patterns across Finn’s face. “Thought that was you I saw, mowing down normies with your laser shotgun. Next time you’re trying to get off on taking out a bunch of high schoolers don’t use your signature weapon, dick.”

“Finn said pro’s never come down here,” Rey contributed, for that was undoubtedly who she must be, watching Ben curiously as he looked down at his chest plate again and tried to take in the merciless revelation that he’d just been ambushed, devastatingly easily. “What are you doing on 8?”

“Came to see us, didn’t he?” Finn replied with a cocky grin. “Han’s way over on the other side of the course, sorry.”

“Only in part, actually,” Ben said, finally recovering at least enough of his composure to look up and fix Finn with a cool stare, though it was surprisingly hard to find his equilibrium with the girl still standing quite close to him. “I came to see her.” He gestured towards her with his gun and her eyes went wide.

“Me?” she asked, nonplussed.  
  
"The girl I've heard so much about," he confirmed, glancing at her, unable to help it somehow, scanning the impossible puzzle standing before him. The raffle girl playing out of pure chance, who had dragged a disgrace and a traitor into Tag Galaxy with her, all climbing to Level 8, her climbing to rank 9, and taking him out, himself, the infamous and dreaded Kylo Ren, with hardly a breath of recognizable effort. Nothing about her made sense, and least of all the puzzled but faint smile she was still aiming at him in the middle of a live game, while his chestplate still glowed with the fatal hit she'd dealt.

“Hey, you keep your hands off of Rey, she doesn’t need any of your First Order bullshit,” Finn said, lowering his gun back to his side and stepping up to Ben as though he intended the move to be threatening. “She’s fine with me and Han.”

“My 'First Order bullshit' rules Tag Galaxy," Ben reminded Finn, turning back to him and looking him over with contempt. "Which you should know, given that First Order found you hosing down used levels and trained you from nothing. Or do you like to pretend you're Millennium Falcon through and through?" Finn's face twitched at the reminder, his smile vanishing and the hand holding his gun rising a foot as though he'd very much like to shoot at Ben himself, another empty threat that Ben watched through narrowed eyes, unimpressed. He’d have to be ambushed quite a few more times before he’d bother to consider being intimidated by someone who wasn’t even ranked in the teens.

“Ren,” someone said in a quiet, abashed voice, interrupting the standoff as all three of them turned to look at the employee that had appeared at Ben’s elbow.

“What?” he demanded.

“Sorry, Ren, you have to leave,” the employee said, gesturing awkwardly to his chest plate, still glowing with the fatal hit. “You’re out of the game.”

“Yeah, that’s right, skulk back off to your pro level,” Finn sneered, pretending not to care but his grip on his laser gun still tight with anger as he turned back towards the rest of the course.

“It’s just a game, Finn,” Rey scolded gently.

“I’ll be at 9,” Ben replied, and they both looked back at him, Finn with a ferocious glare, the girl, unsettlingly, looking like she might smile again. “If you make it that far.”

“We can shoot you there as easily as anywhere else,” Finn replied, looking very much as though he'd pay any amount of money to ensure he was the one who got the chance.

“Good luck,” Rey wished him, as though luck was something he needed, but now she was grinning again after all and for some reason he found he didn’t mind the unintentionally condescending comment, letting the employee lead him away towards the entrance.

“I saw them sneak up on you,” the employee said in an apologetic way as they headed for the door.

“I don’t care,” Ben replied, in a forbidding enough tone that the employee caught the hint and, thankfully, decided it was time to shut up.

At the lobby he waited outside the door back to the rest of Tag Galaxy, letting his eyes adjust to the much brighter fluorescent light, checking the cam footage of the game. Now that he knew which player Rey was he could see her dealing some damage and realized at long last that he’d been shot with the same kind of old-fashioned weapon he himself used, a laser shotgun with blue, concentric shots instead of scattered red. A gun he remembered extremely well. He left the lobby area and approached the elevators, reluctantly glancing up at the ranking screen. He knew the girl would get serious points for taking him out of all people, at point blank range, with a weapon like that, but it was still unpleasant to see that it had been enough to bump her from 9th to 8th. His daily ranking hadn’t been listed yet but it would, now that he was active, which was frankly not a prospect he looked forward to.

Hux was waiting for him outside the lobby of Level 16, sitting at their usual table on his phone, a half-finished pretzel in front of him. Level 16 had its own concessions so that the pro members wouldn’t have to deal with endless lines down in the main levels, and Ben grabbed a soda and ignored the concessions employee’s oddly smug greeting before heading over to join him.

“Phasma’s not out yet?” Ben asked, glancing at 16’s cam feed.

“She’s beating someone else up, for a change,” Hux griped, putting his phone down for a moment and treating Ben to a very cool look. “I thought you were going to stop them at 8.”

“They got the jump on me,” Ben said icily, pretending to watch what was going on in 16.

“So I heard. So everyone’s going to hear. Two employees have told me about it so far,” he said, slanting a look back at the concessions employee. Well, that explained that. Ben frowned but said nothing. He didn’t mind that it had happened, so much- it’s not like he wasn’t due an off day, considering- but it irked him that this entire damn place had nothing better to do than gossip about his one mistake.

“Well, we’ll just have to go to 9 together, then,” Hux continued when Ben didn’t reply, smiling unpleasantly. “Phasma would probably like the chance to run the traitor down anyway. She’s been in a mood ever since his name came up on the board.”

“I believe it,” Ben muttered, taking a drink from his soda. There were a lot of things Phasma didn’t take particularly well, and being unceremoniously thrown over by a mere recruit was high on that list.

“I’ll log us in for 9,” Hux said, pulling the Tag Galaxy app up on his phone. “They’re still not done in 8 yet so by then Phasma should be finished with this bunch.”

“Who’s in with her?”

“Grubs, mostly. Some from Alliance, Senate, Republic,” he recited, listing off names of other pro teams that had been falling in the rankings since First Order took over. “The Praetorians have been contenders, she thinks we should add them in if we ever go further up the league.”

Ben nodded, only half listening. Hux always wanted to go further up the league, getting in on the six-player or nine-player tournaments for the better prize money, but Ben didn’t see the point to it. Plus, league teams usually wanted to standardize gear and the garish red Praetorian plasticene didn’t really appeal to him. It was hard to seriously consider either way while he was busy glaring at the rankings board again, having just noticed that both Finn and Han had moved up a spot. The girl stayed where she was, thankfully. His own ranking had been processed at 44th, which he wouldn’t have gotten at all if he hadn’t taken those few decent shots in 8. Still, he wasn’t used to seeing even his daily start lower than the mid-30s and the sight was enough to make him scowl. That damn girl and her blue-shot gun. How had she even gotten so close to him so quickly without him noticing? He shouldn’t have been that distracted by Finn. She must have ducked right under his arm right as he went to take Finn out, which of course she could do, since she was so much smaller than Ben. He couldn’t tell whether he really thought it was dirty play or if he was just generally irked that it had happened at all. And what was with all the smiling? You didn’t smile at people you’d just killed.

“Do you want the girl?”

“What?” Ben asked, staring around at Hux, who was watching him with an air of impatience.

“Do you want the girl?” Hux repeated, then when Ben continued to stare at him like he’d said something so ludicrous as to be nearly obscene Hux sighed dramatically. “I said, since Phasma’s going to want to take out the traitor herself, obviously, I can do Han if some casual doesn’t get him first. So do you want the girl, or would you rather take Han?”

“Leave the girl to me,” Ben said just as the light above the Level 16 lobby went on with a ding!, signaling the end of the round.

“As long as you actually finish her this time,” Hux muttered as they both watched the cam feed to see what the rankings would be. Phasma had won, unsurprisingly. She was already 19th in the dailies, so this would put her well ahead of Ren and Hux both, but at least Hux was still at 22nd. That left Ben more than twenty places behind both his teammates, and as Hux looked over the main rankings screen and assumed a superior expression Ben privately resolved that he really would shoot Hux in the back this time. He would. He’d steal one of the trooper weapons. Hux would never know.

“Hey, Ren,” Phasma said, taking off her mask as she emerged from 16's lobby, shaking out her short, white-blond hair, slightly sweaty from its confinement.

“We’ve got a round down in 9,” Hux said, pushing her the last few bites of his pretzel. Phasma sat down and finished it off gratefully; she’d eat anything after a good pro fight. “Ren was ambushed by the Rebels in 8.”

“'Ambushed’?” Phasma repeated in disbelief, swiping Ben’s soda even though he hadn’t offered it to her and finishing it in one gulp.

“Finn was on the perimeter near where I was,” Ben explained, noticing with satisfaction that she immediately glowered upon hearing the name. “I was distracted trying to take him out and the girl snuck up on me.”

“I taught him that,” Phasma growled, crumpling the plate the pretzel had been on in one fist.

“Well, now we go kick them off our courses for good,” Hux said, stretching and grabbing his gear. “Ren wants the girl, and we assumed you want the traitor?”

“I’ll murder him,” Phasma promised.

“Then I’ll take Han,” Hux concluded, standing. “Let’s self-shot once we’re done, I don’t care about getting half-points for taking out casuals.”

Ben nodded, standing to his feet and grabbing his gear as they headed towards the elevator. Self-shot meant giving yourself a fatal shot to the chest if you wanted to leave a round early; it didn’t ding your points, but it let you take out a particular opponent you wanted to kill then dip. The practice was mostly used to settle beef with someone and wasn’t popular for that reason- a lot of players said it should be penalized- but again, who was going to stop them? He ducked into the elevator just as Hux hit the 9 button, and the First Order rode down in silence.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: I kind of like seeing Rey and Ben in a situation where they’re not already the center of each other’s world, it’s very refreshing. All my other stuff is post-TLJ; Ben being confused about who Rey is and Rey just being generally nonplussed about him is ~spicy~ to me lol
> 
> My Tumblr, as per:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	3. The First Order hunts the Rebels down on Level 9; Ben offers Rey a truce

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben, Hux, and Phasma all go to Level 9 to try and wipe the Rebels out as a team; Hux after Han, Phasma after Finn, and Ben, of course, after Rey.

The area outside the Level 9 lobby was full when they got there, the line winding around the room as teams at the front were slowly checked in and rented gear and weapons. This high up the Levels the teams were starting to get more and more mixed and some of the grinders recognized Ben, Hux, and Phasma, frowning as they took in their obvious readiness for the round. “Hey, Ren, you in on this?” one of them called over to them.

“I’m not after you,” Ben said without looking around, finding a clear place next to wall where they could wait. Hux and Phasma settled in next to him, already sharing quiet, disparaging comments to each other about some of the fashion choices of the other players, making Ben smile. One of the best things about his teammates was that they, like him, were just as ruthless off the course as on it, meaning anyone who recognized the First Order steered well clear whenever they were together. On his own he got harassed by players and employees alike all the time, but once he was with Hux and Phasma all he had to do was put them between him and the world, like a living wall of derisive intimidation he could carry around with him as soon as he was on Tag Galaxy property.

They’d given the grinders one hell of a shock, and he smiled again as he noticed different groups throughout the line muttering between themselves, shooting the First Order worried or even angry looks over their shoulders. Anyone who thought they’d been in for an easy round was about to make themselves scarce, and good riddance if they did. Neither he nor Hux nor Phasma nor any other decent player had made it to the top of the rankings by avoiding a fight. He’d gotten beaten black and blue on the old Tag Galaxy courses more times than he could count, and so had they.

Of course, apparently not every player had to learn the hard way, and the thought of the girl and her miraculous score immediately turned his smile into a frown. If she was using that blue-shot gun it was possible she’d actually done it herself, which was somehow worse than if she’d been cheating. Maybe Han and Finn also traded the gun back and forth, loading it with all the easiest, cleanest shots so they could spike that one ranking? It wasn’t unheard of but it was difficult to pull off without getting caught, either by the cameras or by game score algorithms put in place to stop that kind of thing. In that case he almost trusted the cameras more, since the games were streamed live all over the building for more than just employee gossip. Surely after eight rounds someone would have seen?

“You want to talk about it before we go in?” Phasma asked Ben, glancing around at him.

“We don’t need to.”

“I don’t know,” Hux said with a smirk, “maybe we should hide you in a dark corner where you won’t get hurt. That girl could sneak up on you again, and that’d make all of us look bad.”

“Maybe I should take you up to Starkiller and bump you down to 7th,” Ben deadpanned right back.

“I wonder if they know we’re here,” Phasma said, ignoring their sniping. “It does mean they could set up another ambush for us, since they must already be inside.”

“Unlikely,” Hux said. Ben just shrugged. The Rebels already knew he’d be after them, since he’d told them as much, but they might not have guessed he wouldn’t have just troopers filling out his team this time. It didn’t seem to matter either way, since teams already on the course weren’t allowed into the ramps or nests until everyone was in and had time to get oriented, so what could they do? Hide behind some barricades?

“The traitor will have something planned, I’m sure of that,” Phasma said, turning to Ben. “What about the other two? What are they like?”

“Han’s a ghost,” Ben said. “Never stays out in the open long enough for you to get a clear bead on him. Hard to corner. The girl…” he considered, not sure how to say what he suspected. “I think she might be pro from another course, but I don’t know. She doesn’t take it seriously at all. Kind of naive.”

“When you’re done with the traitor we’ll both run down Han if I don’t have him by then,” Hux told Phasma. “Then Ren takes the girl and we’ve knocked them out for good.”

Phasma nodded and Ben shrugged. Any plan in which he basically got to do what he wanted was fine by him, and he had little doubt they could handle Finn and Han between them.

They ended up being one of the last teams to check in, entering the course while it was still partially lit, the other players milling around restlessly. 9 was one of Ben’s least favorite courses, covered in fake plastic plants that made it difficult both to see and to navigate, but at least fairly easy to snipe other players from cover. Without a word Hux and Phasma moved off right, down the ramp to the floor, and Ben strayed left, waiting for the signal that would let him move up the ramp to the elevated levels. The topiary was thinner there and he preferred shooting from a height when the object was just to target a few specific players and get out. There were plenty of others waiting with him but he ignored them, scanning the main floor area he stood above, trying to spot the Rebels. He couldn’t see them for now but the place was hazy and crowded, so that was no great surprise.

“Alright, everybody, doors are closed!” an employee said over the speakers in an unnecessarily cheery voice, and the lights dimmed back down to semi-darkness. “You’ve got thirty seconds to find a position, then it’s weapons hot! Have a great game, everyone!”

The rest of the people waiting to move up the ramp hurried that way the moment the lights went down but Ben waited, watching the crowds shift and disperse. He spotted someone he thought was Finn moving right, towards where Hux and Phasma had gone, but didn’t see Han or the girl. A tinny pre-recorded voice counted down and he waited until it was only ten seconds to go before starting to climb, following the ramp as it arced around the room, the path dipping smoothly in and out of clumps of fake flora, offering vantage points that were decent enough places to take a shot at the players down below but woefully unprotected. Most of these were already occupied and those players eyed him nervously as he passed. He was less than halfway to his destination when the voice counted down to zero and the weapons activated.

Pow pow pow. A couple yellow-shot handguns sounded from behind and he took cover behind a pillar, impatiently pushing fronds out of his way as he scanned the ramp. They were firing from cover too, and he noted a gap between the plants and the wall next to him and pushed his way into it, fighting not to sneeze as the less-well-tended fake leaves drifted dust down all over him as he passed. It allowed him to flank his opponents, however, and he managed to get both of them before they could figure out where he'd gone.

“Aw, come on Ren!” one complained, but he was already pushing his way back out onto the clear path, dusting his clothes off as he continued.

The main problem was the sniper nests, which almost always had someone inside to shoot and someone else to guard their backs. Ben cleared three as he went and left the rest alone when they didn’t fire on him as he passed, finding at last an empty vantage point and checking the area down below. Phasma was visible on the far side of the course, but he couldn’t see anyone else he immediately recognized.

Finally he reached the end of the ascending ramp, which opened onto a wide circle of empty cement killing ground before narrowing to the very last sniper’s nest, easy to hold, hard to get into. There were several people there already- two teams, from what he could tell- and he made sure they didn’t see him coming, keeping tight to the side of the ramp and staying low so the rise would hide him. He went on his stomach for the last few feet, and when he finally entered their field of vision it was with only his mask and the barrel of his gun visible, neither of which had sensors they could fire on. They tried anyway, dazzling his line of sight a couple times as lasers of green and purple danced across his vision, but it still took little time to go through them. It turned out to be six players in all, and would have been much harder if the two players who had been in the nest hadn’t come out to see what was going on.

“Pro’s shouldn’t even be allowed on anything lower than 10!” someone spat as the dead players went past Ben as he got to his feet, favoring him with dark looks and low, growled implications detailing where he could stick his overpowered gun. At least they left fairly quickly, and he took their spot and looked down, scanning.

The game had gone faster than he’d thought. Phasma was nowhere to be seen but Hux was pursuing Finn through some of the shrubbery, meaning Han must be out already. That only left the girl, and with so few players still on the course it couldn’t take that long to spot her. He stayed carefully in the shadow of the gap he was watching from, scanning. Movement caught his eye– an all-too-familiar grimy vest, ducking from one pillar to another, gun in one hand and a battered walkie talkie in the other.

Han? Ben shifted slightly to see better, quietly cursing Hux. What was he doing going after Finn if he hadn’t gotten Han yet?! It had been his idea to do man-to-man coverage but that was still clearly Han down there, hesitating as he seemed to edge toward a barricade that would give him a better shot on the lower level but leave him wide open from above. Ben pulled up his gun, about to take aim, then turned a complete 180 at the last second, sighting down the barrel.

Rey stood on the narrow path to the nest less than five feet from him, her gun also up and aimed at Ben; if he’d leaned out to target Han he would have sacrificed his cover, and she would have gotten him at point-blank range a second time. “So,” Ben said, watching as she took a careful step back, crouching slightly to shield as many of her chest plate sensors as possible, her gun still up. “You thought that was going to work on me twice.”

“Got you with it on 8,” she said with a grin, despite being caught out in the open with no cover to speak of. “Aren’t you going to shoot me?”

He examined her for a moment, torn. On the one hand he should, and then go after Han properly to finish the job. But on the other hand, if Hux was going after Finn without doing Han first that must mean he and Phasma had switched targets, and even Han at his best was no match for Phasma. Plus he had a few questions for this Rebel before he shut her and the rest of the Rebellion out of Tag Galaxy for good. “No,” he said finally, looking up from his weapon but not lowering it. “Truce.”

“Truce?” she asked, grin fading a bit in her confusion.

“Guns up,” he clarified. “Let’s talk for a second.”

“You first,” she said immediately. That was fair; he was still under cover and she wasn’t. He raised his gun until the barrel pointed at the ceiling, holding his other hand up as well. She mirrored him, backing down to the open area and turning out a little to give him room to do the same. He followed slowly, not wanting to startle her, taking the opportunity to examine her head to toe. The light was better on 9 than it was on 8 but he didn’t see anything he hadn’t seen before. She seemed like she was probably pretty under the tag mask, but that was neither here nor there.

“I have questions,” she said once they were standing in the open area, both of them still holding their guns up but lowering the empty hand.

“Do you?”

“Why are you trying to kill my friends and me?”

“Your ‘friends’ are a traitor and a broke has-been past his prime,” Ben said without hesitating. “The First Order has personal business with both of them. I don’t really want to kill you, but…” he shrugged, and saw her twitch, eyeing his gun with alarm. The barrel stayed pointed towards the ceiling and she relaxed.

“Finn’s told me about you,” she replied.

“Oh has he.”

“He says the First Order’s just a bunch of bullies who can’t stand to let anyone onto their turf who’s actually good because they care more about controlling everybody than about actually playing the game.”

“Maybe,” Ben said indifferently.

She blinked a couple of times, clearly thrown off balance. “And that doesn’t bother you?”

“No.” If she knew even a third of the things that were said about him in a given day, either to his face or to someone who repeated it to him later, she wouldn’t have been nearly so surprised. “Where’d you get that gun?” he asked, nodding toward it.

“The gun?” she repeated, looking up at it reflexively. It was all the opening he needed; he brought his own gun back down to level in a quick, smooth arc, shooting from the hip-- a move, he was ashamed to admit even in his own head, that he’d learned from Han.

Pow. His aim was slightly off, striking her in the stomach rather than the chest, but still solidly centered, a red circle of scattershot laser dots making her chest plate sensors bloom red in response to the fatal hit. She stared down at her own stomach in disbelief for a moment, then glared at him.

“You said we had a truce!” she accused, indignant rage making her appear far more formidable than she had while smiling at everyone and everything.

“Yes. Where’d you get the gun?” he asked again, taking a step toward her. She backed away, dropping her gun so she held it across her stomach in a defensive position.

“I should file a complaint about you,” she snapped.

Her and everyone else on every course in this place, apparently. “Truce isn’t in the rules,” he reminded her patiently. “It’s an informal agreement. Galaxy management has nothing to do with it. That was my gun, once,” he told her, glancing at it again, the familiar shape, the nicks and dings in the casing. He was surprised how well he remembered it now, seeing it in front of him. He'd thought they would have tossed it after he left but apparently not.

“What?” the girl said, nonplussed as she scanned him from head to toe, as though the visual alone might fill in the blanks.

“Where’d you get it?”

“I found it,” she finally confessed. “It was in one of the storage rooms at Millennium Falcon.”

“Let me buy it from you.”

She blinked, the request- demand really- catching her off guard again. If Ben was being honest, this time she wasn’t the only one. He hadn’t realized what he’d intended to say until it was already said, and could tell by her expression she was already about to give him a hard, unforgiving no.

“Alright, players!” a cheery voice sang out as the game clock alarm went off and the lights snapped back on, making both Ben and Rey jump. “Round’s over! Please return all rented gear to the lobby and exit the course.”

“I’ll see you on 10, Kylo Ren,” Rey said, giving him one last angry look before turning on her heel and marching back down the ramp. He let her go with only one long moment's consideration of her back as she retreated, then ducked back into the vantage point and looking down on the main level to see who was left. Han was halfway to the door, chest plate still dark. Apparently the Rebels would be playing one more game after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Having seen TLJ (and written a lot of post-TLJ material, lol) as well as now gearing up to go see TROS and have my world rocked again, it's always a fun reminder how emo and frankly, how much of an asshole TFA-Ren could be. His POV is endless entertainment. Also, I've said it before and I'll say it again: you guys have no idea how much every subscription and kudos and comment and even just every hit matters! Thank you so much for your encouragement; it means the world every time and I love you all <3 <3
> 
> Tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com


	4. Han and Ben, reunited

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Han seeks Ben out while he's on his own; they have the confrontation that's been brewing from the moment Han signed the roster on his way into Tag Galaxy

“Phasma’s in the locker rooms,” Hux told Ben without preamble when the met by the elevators, pressing the button to call one up. “Punching something, probably. The traitor got her.”

“Han survived,” Ben couldn’t help but point out.

“I had to go after the traitor once he’d killed Phasma,” Hux said defensively. “And I got him, too, but Han got behind me when I wasn’t looking.”

“Yes, he does that,” Ben said as an elevator arrived and they got on, Hux hitting the number and swiping his card for the ground floor level that would take the to the member’s locker room. Ben wondered for a moment if he should remind Hux that he’d warned both of them ahead of time about how slippery Han was, just to see Hux lose it, but decided against needling him just now. Phasma was already going to be aggro’d enough for the three of them and if he was honest he didn’t mind that he’d be playing another round against Rey, especially now that she had a reason to play a little more seriously. And maybe when she cooled off she’d reconsider selling him the gun, which would be a bonus. His own gun was a copy, really, and he’d far rather have the original he’d grown up training on. It had been all but an extension of him for years–- now that he’d seen it again he was surprised and almost a little baffled by how badly he wanted to have it in his hands.

Phasma was indeed punching something, specifically a kickboxing bag in the tiny member’s gym attached to the locker room. It was empty, which was unusual for this time of day, and Ben privately suspected it hadn’t been when Phasma had arrived. She tended to have that effect, bleeding an aggressive intensity that not many could be around for long and even fewer wanted to.

“It was one round, Phasma,” Ben said, making use of being maybe the only person who could talk to her like that without getting his head bitten off. He still got a ferocious glare for his trouble, then she shook her hair out of her eyes and straightened up. 

“I know.”

“So, we’re logged in for 10?” Ben asked, glancing over his shoulder at Hux. Hux nodded.

“You got the girl?” Phasma asked, undoing the velcro straps of her gloves with her teeth.

“Yes.”

“Good, that should drop her some.” Ben shrugged; privately he doubted that, since she must have taken out at least a few people on that ramp to get to where he was.

“Shit,” Hux swore, looking at the screen of his phone. “Level’s stacked a lot higher than usual.”

“Let me see,” Phasma demanded, taking the phone from him. “They must have heard we’re after the Rebellion,” she said thoughtfully. “Some of these teams never go down as far as 10.”

“They’re gunning for us,” Hux said.

“Obviously,” she snorted, thrusting his phone back at him, but it seemed to be what she’d needed to break out of her mood and she pushed her way past them back into the locker room to rinse off and suit up. 

“I’ll meet you guys at 10,” Ben said, not bothering to try and look at the phone too. It didn’t matter all that much either way if the Level was stacked or not, or even if it was because other teams were gunning for them or not–- every other day on 16 it seemed everyone there was specifically trying to kill one or more of them. There had been days Ben himself had been pursued up and down the course by the whole crowd, it seemed, and Hux and Phasma had just trailed the pack and picked them off one by one. At this point they strategized around it, rather than risk being caught off guard. Besides, on 10 there would still be enough casuals to gum up anyone really going for the crown.

With Phasma in the showers and Hux being his usual annoying self Ben dropped his gun off in the cages to charge and headed for 16's concessions, the only other place there really was to go in between rounds unless you wanted to browse the shop for overpriced mid-range guns and gear and other try-hard paraphernalia. His timing proved to be lucky; 16 was in the middle of a round and concessions was empty, the bored employees sitting on the counter chatting to each other when he walked up. He bought some black licorice just for something to do and took a table on the far side of the room where he was the most unlikely to be bothered, pulling out his phone and double-checking the round. Hux hadn’t been joking when he’d said the Level was stacked and Ben scrolled through some of the teams he was only vaguely familiar with, trying to match them to their stats in case there was anyone worth looking out for.

“Ben.”

Ben looked up reflexively and nearly dropped his phone; Han stood across the table from him, looking wildly out of place in his grimy vest, his ancient tag gun holstered at his side like he was some kind of gunslinger out of a cowboy movie. Ben had forgotten that he did that, and now he saw it and remembered, and hated remembering.

“They call me Kylo Ren here,” he said stiffly, putting his phone down on the table and leaning back, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “Shouldn’t you be down on 10 with your new team?”

“I wanted to talk to you, Ben,” Han said, deliberately ignoring the ‘Kylo Ren’ title for no fucking reason. Yup, still an asshole.

“So talk.”

Han shifted uncomfortably, glancing between the chair nearest him and then to Ben as though wondering whether or not he should sit. Ultimately he decided against it, grasping the back of the chair with both hands instead. “Nice spread you got here.”

“Not a place I ever thought I’d have to see you,” Ben said coolly. Which was one of the perks of playing here.

“No, it’s not my usual. How have you been?”

“Better than I was before.”

Han sighed, as though Ben was somehow the problem in this conversation. “Look, I’m not saying we didn’t make mistakes. But you should come back to Millennium Falcon. You can’t tell me you’re happy here.”

Ben couldn’t help but just stare for a long, tense moment, sure he couldn’t have heard what Han had just said. “I play at Tag Galaxy now,” was all he could come up with, not nearly enough to express whatever the hell it was he actually wanted to say. He’d need a month to say all of that, and another month on top just to think it up and put it all in order.

“Yeah, I know, Snoke’s new protege,” Han said as if that was somehow an insult, as if Ben wasn’t already fairly sure he knew what Han thought about his patron.

“Snoke was the one of the best pro players of the last two decades. Still is.” 

“Being ruthless doesn’t make you better. Ben, you’re just another player to him. He wants the Tag Galaxy chain to sell. He’s not sponsoring you because you’re good, he’s sponsoring you because he’s a greedy bastard running a business and while everyone wants to kill you they’ll keep coming in.”

“And what about you?” Ben shot back, itching to stand, itching to use his height to his advantage, his general size to his advantage. He hadn’t been face-to-face with Han since he was a teen but by now he must have four inches on him at least. “Just come back to Millennium Falcon to prop up your sorry excuse for a tag arena like it’s not the worthless pile of trash it’s always been?”

“Hey, when you were at Millennium Falcon you had real friends, and a real team!” Han reminded him, his hands tightening on the back of the chair. “Who are you hanging out with now, those First Order assholes? There are still people at Falcon who miss you. Your mother, for one thing. And… and me,” he mumbled, looking away as though it was hard to admit.

“I don’t care!” Ben snapped, and now he did stand to his full height, so quickly and forcefully he bumped against the table, a painful collision across his thighs that he ignored. “Don’t come here thinking you’re going to steal me back. This is my arena, this is my team. I don’t give a fuck what you think about it.”

“Ben, I don’t know what went wrong with this,” Han said, gesturing between them, his jaw tight as he said it, clearly working to keep his tone measured. “Maybe I wasn’t the best father and that’s fine, you can punish me for that. But what about your mother? Not a visit, not a word, what the hell is wrong with you?” 

His tone made Ben instantly want to lash out- hell, everything about Han made him want to start a shouting match right here in concessions- but Han kept invoking Leia, and that made Ben hesitate even though he hated that anyone or anything from the Falcon still had that kind of hold over him. When Snoke had made him his pro offer he’d stacked everything else on top of it- the promise of a new and better team, a free membership to the old arena plus the brand new one Snoke was still building at the time, even a place of his own to make a clean break of it- and Ben had always agreed that it was better not to even think about before, not to talk about it, not to respond when someone else did, no matter how many ways Hux found to jab him with it. But he could have called his mother. He could have. And there was no point pretending he hadn’t at least thought about it. 

“I have my own life now,” he said at last, reluctantly, keeping his tone as expressionless as he could. “I don’t want anything to do with the Falcon.”

“Come back, Ben,” Han urged, picking up everything Ben hadn’t said, the giant gap that left for things he might still want something to do with. “Even if it’s just to visit. Let her see you.”

Ben hesitated again, longer than he should have- really, he shouldn’t have at all- but his phone buzzed on the table and he glanced at it to see that Hux had texted him. Instant relief flooded him that he had a way out of this conversation, relief and renewed hatred for Han, for the doubt he brought with him, for the childhood Ben would rather forget.

“The First Order’s getting ready for 10,” he informed Han, scooping up the phone and his mask, getting ready to leave. “I don’t want you here, and I don’t want to talk to you again. Leave me the hell alone.”

“Ben–,” Han said, reaching toward him as he passed, but Ben shoved his hand aside, keeping his head down and ignoring the curious stares of the concessions employees. By the time 10 was over everyone in the building would probably know that Han had sought him out here, that they’d argued about something, but the employees weren’t close enough to have heard what they’d said and no one but Hux and Snoke knew that the owners of Millennium Falcon were also his parents. Snoke had leaned on Hux pretty hard about not bringing that up under any circumstances- Hux certainly wasn’t keeping secrets for Ben because they were just buddies like that- and there was no reason to believe anyone else knew or would guess. Not unless Han decided to try to bring it up again on Tag Galaxy property.

The elevator seemed to take a long time arriving but Ben stayed facing forward and Han didn’t come after him. Of course he didn’t. But maybe for once what Ben had said had made it through somehow; maybe this was the last conversation he’d have to have with a man he’d once actually acknowledged as his father. He didn’t think of him that way anymore; he’d been determined not to for years and he wasn’t going to change his tune now.

When he reached the locker room Phasma and Hux were waiting for him, and as he retrieved his gun from its locker, now back up to full charge, Hux asked irritably, “So, are we stopping them here, or are we going to chase them all over the arena?”

“We’re stopping them here,” Ben said in his coldest and most forbidding tone, one that even Hux and Phasma knew meant to shut the fuck up until further notice. Hux curled his lip but said nothing; Phasma just nodded. They didn’t know why he was in a mood and they didn’t need to. All that mattered now was getting Han out of this building and out of Ben’s life, hopefully for good this time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I cannot even describe how difficult this scene was to write! While I want to roughly follow the broad outline of the movies I'm obviously also doing my own thing, and trying to strike that balance between canon Han and Kylo Ren from TFA and Han and Ben from this fic is delicate to say the least-- especially since Han's not really likely to be killed by Ben during a round of ~laser tag~ is he?


	5. The First Order meets Han on 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You knew it had to happen

10 was Ben’s least favorite course he’d ever been on, and stepping into it about to play a round didn’t improve his already incredibly sour temper. This one had no elevated pathways or nests; in fact even the ceiling was lower than on any other level, the tracked lighting and smoke machines pointed straight down, giving the whole place an unpleasant cramped, humid feeling. The walls and barriers was laid out like several disjointed mazes, truncated courses and haphazard angles cutting off almost every clear line of sight. It took patience and stealth to navigate 10 successfully, and patience was something Ben didn’t feel he was very much capable of at the moment. He’d far rather be on Starkiller, cutting others down as they tried to do the same to him, skill for skill, hit for hit. Forcing everyone simultaneously together and apart like this was his least favorite way to play.

“We could take it as a unit,” Hux suggested as they headed towards the mid-right wall and the best mini-maze to hold from if you could take the center. They’d been farther up the line this time so they’d gotten in with some of the other first teams, ignoring the jabs of players who recognized them and wanted to make it exceptionally clear that they’d joined this low Level game specifically to kill as many of the three First Order members as they could. “Eliminate the advantage of the blind spots by covering all the major points of attack.”

“The Rebels will just go running,” Ben growled, glaring at a player who got in his way as he was trying to pass through a narrow gap in the barriers. The player shrank back and he moved on. “If we take 10 as a unit we survive, but we won’t win,” he continued. “We definitely won’t knock the Rebellion out, they’ll see us coming and just stay on the move until they’ve run down the clock.”

“We could herd them into a corner,” Hux said. “Make our presence known, keep them running until we’ve got them backed up somewhere they can’t escape.”

“They probably don’t know this course, and even if they got hold of a course map between rounds it’s impossible to memorize that quickly,” Phasma put in. “Unless the traitor’s leading them around there’s no way they won’t get disoriented once they start moving. So where do we start from?” she asked as they reached the portion of the maze they were looking for. It was still empty, fortunately, so they settled in to wait.

“The back,” Hux decided. “They’ll expect us to herd them from the entry in, so we’ll do it backwards, from the farthest point. The back wall’s not hard to navigate once you get to it, and we have the advantage in knowing the course.”

“Man to man?” Ben asked, not sure who he’d want if it was.

“I want the traitor,” Phasma insisted immediately, flushing behind her mask, her jaw clenching.

“We need to work as a team first,” Hux interjected, shooting her a warning look that got him a couple choice words for his trouble. “Once we’ve got them cornered the execution’s the main thing. It doesn’t matter who shoots who.”

Well, that left that open then. Ben leaned against the wall, glaring at anyone who tried to come in to see if this spot was still up for grabs. If the choice came down to it to shoot Han or the girl he couldn’t decide which he’d rather have. Han, probably, purely to take him out with his own two hands. At the same time he’d also rather he was the one to take out the girl, but in a somewhat different way. Was it that he just felt entitled to the kill somehow? Maybe. Certainly he was the only one who cared. Neither Phasma nor Hux would probably notice at all as long as he left them the traitor, which he was glad to do. Finn was annoying, but neither particularly interesting nor rage-inducing. 

From within their sheltered area they could hear other teams coming in, chatting among themselves, calling back and forth as they investigated different spots and tried to decide where was better to start from. It made the silence within their own little mazed-off corner that much more resounding, and when the extremely cheery announcement that the round was about to start came on all three of them jumped, glancing up to discover just a beat too late that there was a sound system speaker hanging from the tracking directly overhead, difficult to spot among the lights and smoke machine nozzles until it bleated and gave players a heart attack. They heard the countdown out without moving except to hoist their guns, watching as the between-round lights went down and were replaced by the multicolored lights of the level, immediately made murky as the smoke machines hissed and began to drift misty columns down towards the ground.

“They’ll be waiting for us,” Hux said quietly as the countdown neared its end. “Ren, on the left entrance. Phasma, on the right. I’ll back up.” Nobody responded but they all knelt, Ren and Phasma hoisting their guns, Hux keeping his pointed toward the floor in neutral position. The clock hit zero. The weapons were unlocked.

It seemed almost to release a floodgate. From both the left and right entrances players poured in, weapons blazing, shooting wildly at roughly hip-to-chest level, hoping to hit one of the First Order members. Their kneeling position kept them below the general line of fire and also partially shrouded them in smoke as it built up against the floor, confusing insurgents for that crucial moment that was all it took for the First Order to mow them down. They must have taken out a dozen players between both entrances, Ben on the left, Phasma on the right, and Hux switching back and forth between each depending on who was taking the heavier fire. It escaped no one that he was hidden bodily behind both his teammates, giving him by far the better chance of survival between the three of them- when he wasn’t around Ben liked to comment to Phasma that plans arranged this way were Hux’s ‘bodyguard protocols’- and when the initial assault finally dissipated he was the first to stand.

“We could almost just stay here,” Phasma said as she and Ben stood as well, keeping their weapons pointed towards the entrances automatically. “Let them come to us and take them out one by one.”

“Boring,” Hux sneered. “Let’s go now, before the next wave of hopefuls has to be put down.” Phasma nodded, striding toward her entrance with her gun up, leading the way towards the back of the course. Hux followed and then Ben, guarding their backs in case they were pursued. They only had a moment’s peace, enough to make it around two corners of the maze and nearly out, before the other players descended on them again, a second firefight ensuing that ended the same way. Their enemies had even less chance now than they had before; with the hard cover of the last corner between themselves and them, the First Order picked them off easily. Hux backed Phasma, who was standing on the edge of the open area, clearing the way forward, and at a word from them Ben backed out into the open, ducking behind a barricade and checking their position. There was a maze in the center of the course that they needed to get through, then after that a killing ground to eat up and they could start clearing. He sighed, automatically directing the breath down and out so he wouldn’t risk fogging up his mask. It was going to be both difficult and tedious. They continued on, shooting down other players as they went, and right before he ducked into the maze he saw out of the corner of his eye someone’s chest plate light up with the pattern of the blue shot gun.

“They’re close,” he told the others as they continued into the cover of the maze. “The girl’s off to our right.”

“We’ll swing right when we get out, then,” Hux decided. “Wheel around and start pushing them back.”

“How many others do you think we’ve gotten?” Phasma asked. Hux and Ben shrugged in unison.

“Does it matter?” Hux said for both of them.

“I think more than thirty,” she said speculatively, her own gun coming up sharply in the middle of the sentence, shooting down some poor casual coming around the corner and not expecting anyone else in this maze, his gun down and his chest plate wide open. “How much longer in the round?”

“Can’t be much more than twenty minutes,” Hux replied. Ben just sighed again. A terrible time for a terrible course.

They cleared the second maze and ranged themselves on either side of its opposite entrance, clearing the killing ground beyond as well then pivoting back towards the area they’d started from. They weren’t the only ones who had been doing work; from what Ben could see the level had been emptied at least by half, if not more, and those who were left were playing much more carefully, staying under cover longer, picking their shots rather than just firing at anything nearby that moved. They were playing, in short, at a higher level, and he surmised that some if not most of them were from the teams that had come down here to kill the First Order specifically.

Pow. The shot came from behind, in the area they thought they’d cleared, and Hux’s back plate lit up dead center, red with the fatal shot. He growled in frustration, whirling as Phasma and Ben both ducked under cover.

“Rebel scum,” Hux snapped at whoever had gotten him.

“Off the course, kid,” a familiar voice replied. “You know the rules.”

“It’s Han,” Ben told Phasma as Hux moved off. “I’ll deal with him. Keep going towards the front and try to get the others.”

“You sure you want to split?” she asked, frowning behind her mask. On 10 it was a more than fair question; the course was alright to navigate as a team, but much more difficult to play solo. Another reason Ben, who preferred to be left to his own devices, hated it.

“They might not see you coming as easily if you’re on your own,” he invented on the spot. “Head back up the left; when I’m done with Han I’ll head up the right. You want the traitor?”

Phasma nodded, lips pursing in undisguised hatred. “You want the girl?”

He shrugged, not willing to commit to it with Han right in front of him. “Take her if you’ve got her.” Phasma nodded and moved off, ducking between barriers and into the nearest mid-course maze without ever giving Han a clear shot. Ben headed the other way, towards the wall, putting it to his back so that at least if he had to cross open space it would be without any more nasty surprises coming from behind. The killing ground seemed empty, as it had before, and as he circled it he saw where Han had been hiding, a shadowy, smoke-filled corner directly next to a maze entrance, so he could pop in and out of it at will. It was one of the mazes they’d cleared so he must have followed them, staying far enough back to keep tabs on where they were going without ever being close enough to be in sight. It wasn’t a bad strategy. Bit boring, maybe, but not terrible.

“Ben,” Han said, standing when he saw Ben was on his own, coming out from behind his cover, his gun raised. “Truce.”

“No,” Ben said, keeping his gun pointed directly at him, his finger on the trigger. He should shoot. He wanted to shoot. He didn’t.

“Come home,” Han said, after a long breath where they just stood, eyeing each other.

“No matter how many times you say it I’m not going to change my mind.”

“Forever?” Hand asked, lowering his weapon so it pointed at the floor, crossing the killing ground a step, coming towards him.

“I’m glad I left,” Ben said briefly. “I like it here. I don’t want to go back, and that’s not going to change.”

“So what, this is your life now?” Han said sarcastically, gesturing around them. “You’re the biggest asshole in a house of assholes?”

“Maybe I do take after my father in some ways after all.” Far from pissing Han off the insult barely seemed to phase him; he just sighed, taking another step towards Ben.

“Look, kid, I’m not going to chase you up and down this whole building just so I can repeat myself all day,” Han said. “I’ve got to get back to the Falcon and finish wrapping things up. I’m retiring.”

That, of all the things Han had said today, was what made Ben’s jaw drop. “What?” he managed to say. Han had been in the game for decades, long before Ben was born, and he’d been a legend, once, before he’d started betting too hard on the games and got nabbed and washed out. And the Falcon, who would take over there? His mother was as old as Han, and a formidable woman but not one who had ever really cared for the business. Imagining the Falcon without Han was like trying to imagine something impossible; they were practically the same thing.

“Well, it’s not like I was going to stay on forever,” Han said, watching Ben like he knew exactly what he was thinking. “Of course, I was hoping my son would be helping me run the place one day–.”

“Stop,” Ben snapped, his finger tightening on the trigger convulsively, and the gun fired, a familiar red pattern appearing across Han’s chest plate only for a moment before the chest plate lit up red in response. Pow. A fatal hit, and at close range, since Han was practically standing in front of the barrel. Han shook his head, sighing.

“Alright, Ben” he said, holstering his weapon. “You win.” He turned toward the exit, making his way through the course, and Ben watched him go, not feeling at all how he’d thought he would. There was no sense of triumph, or relief, or even just the brief, momentary pleasure of taking another player out before moving on to the next one. He just felt… a little lost, if he was being honest. As though he’d missed something, an opening of a different kind, one that was gone now.

Pow. Ben glanced down, noting a splotchy white pattern down one side of his chest plate, a pattern he automatically turned sideways to hide, glancing toward where the shot had originated from. Finn stood at the entrance to one of the mazes along the side walls, gun pointed off and away, not smiling.

“Guess Han’s out,” he said briefly, giving Ben a look like he was something smelly he’d found on the bottom of his shoe. “Just couldn’t resist, could you? Had to get those points.” Ben shrugged, not missing that Finn still hadn’t leveled his gun in Ben’s direction to finish the job; he thought the hit had been fatal.

“Well, two down, one to go,” Finn said when Ben didn’t respond, turning away. Ben brought his gun up, hesitating only a moment before firing; the shot hit Finn’s back plate dead center. Pow. Fatal hit. Finn whirled around, seeing Ben’s chest plate properly, and that his earlier hit had only grazed him.

“Cheater,” Finn accused, eyes narrowing. “This is exactly the kind of bullshit–.”

“I don’t care,” Ben said, brushing past him into the maze Finn had been using for cover. Finn shouted something after him, something no doubt unpleasant that he ignored, moving quickly to put some ground between himself and where any player might have last seen him. If Finn had been standing at the entrance to this maze long enough to see Ben off Han then that meant he’d probably already cleared it; that turned out to be the case, and Ben made it end to end before seeing anyone else. How much time was left on the game clock? Not much. Unless Phasma had already gotten the girl there was still one Rebel left to hunt down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Original tumblr A/N: as always with this kind of fic, the real challenge is designing each laser tag course that comes along. Setting, setting, setting, right? I’ve got a couple more in mind, but on the way to Starkiller I may have to start googling for ideas, ngl
> 
> My tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	6. Ben pursues Rey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A double entendre is always a good start, no? ;)

The girl turned out to be posted up by the other end of the maze behind a nearby barricade, and Ben nearly exited straight into her line of fire. She hadn't seen him yet, concentrating her shots on some players who were trying to flank her from the other side, and he hung back a moment to watch. Her shots were precise, her strategic targeting all but flawless. Yes, she didn't kneel behind the barrier completely, leaving the upper edge of her chest plate exposed, and yes, she'd chosen a position dependent on Finn occupying the maze Ben now stood in that was left vulnerable if Finn got taken out, as he had been, but those were rookie mistakes and could be fixed by some basic training easily. Her aim, however, was excellent, and she had nerves of steel, picking players off as they came after her one after another with steady hands and deadly accuracy.

Finally she dealt with the issues to her right and scanned left, towards where Ben still stood partially under cover, watching. He couldn't fault her reaction time either; the moment she realized he was there she was off like a shot, dodging behind a barricade with a better angle of cover, then into another maze on this side. He followed, calmly cutting down two players who got too excited upon seeing him and stood out of their positions, exposing their sensors. He couldn't see Phasma; she'd probably gotten pinned down on the other side, where most of the players that were left seemed to be concentrated.

The maze the girl had ducked into twisted into uncomfortable switchbacks, forcing Ben to follow more slowly than he would have liked, checking his route at every corner, sighting down empty passageways filled up to waist-height with fog, checking and double-checking to make sure there was no one waiting on their stomach under the available line of sight. It was what he would have done. He'd only been in the maze a minute before he realized he was being followed and was forced to speed up, dodging down a side passage and out instead of down the longer passage leading forward. The girl was waiting for him, winging him just as he ducked behind cover. Pow. Under normal circumstances the shot wouldn't have been fatal; having already taken the partial from Finn, however, his chest plate lit up red. He barely had time even to realize he was out of the game before the lights snapped on and the usual cheery announcement sounded out, ending the round.

“Good shot,” he said anyway, standing as the fog machines stopped pumping and the smoke began to dissipate. Other players that were left started to straggle towards the door, guns down, some of them undoing their chest and back plates or taking their masks off. Ben followed suit, ditching his mask and running a hand through hair that was getting too long again, appreciating the relief of the fresh-ish air on his temples and the back of his neck.

“It wasn't a good shot at all,” she disagreed, coming out from cover as well, frowning as she examined him. “I thought I barely grazed you.”

“Finn got a partial earlier,” Ben explained, sitting on the barricade for a moment, studying her. “Are we really going to do this all day? What the hell do you get out of it, besides wasting my time?”

“Besides the satisfaction of killing you over and over again?” she corrected, and something about her glare unsettled him. It wasn't that the sensation of being glared at was just so super unique, he realized, it was just that it was so different from when she was smiling. “If we win a consecutive round on every level we all get memberships to Tag Galaxy. It's in the raffle rules.”

“Why do you want a membership here?” he asked, surprised. The clarification of the raffle rules was news to him, but then again he couldn't fathom what he might want from Tag Galaxy badly enough to enter a company raffle, much less read the rules of one.

“I want to play here. And it's partly to get Finn back in as well, after what you guys did to him. This place isn't supposed to be just for people YOU like.”

“It's not,” Ben protested, mildly stung that she thought so. Phasma and Hux might pull something shady to boot someone every now and again, but he didn't. If he did he would've cleared half the clientele in no time.

“What is your problem anyway?” she demanded, ignoring the protest. “Why does it even matter to you if we're here or not?”

“It doesn't,” he said, entirely honestly. “I don't mind you being here. You're good. More than good-- you could go pro, if you wanted.”

That stymied her; she'd clearly expected an attack of some kind. She glared at him a moment longer as a couple other players passed between them, heading out. Employees were already entering the course, checking for loiterers; it wouldn't be long until they got told to move on. “If going pro looks like this, I'd rather not,” she decided, gesturing towards him, a pretty weak blow if it was meant as an insult. Ben just shrugged.

“There's worse things. Single player can be rough, but you're already ranking high in the dailies, I don't think it'd take you long to start ranking in legacy.”

“I'd rather play with a team.”

Now she was just being obstinate on purpose, he couldn't imagine why. What kind of bull had Finn been feeding her to convince her that Tag Galaxy was hell, and Ben it's reigning devil? “Then play with mine,” he said calmly, standing as an employee came towards them, starting toward the door. Rey was forced to walk with him, not looking at all happy about it, but Ben took advantage of the extra few seconds to talk to her when they weren't trying to shoot each other. “We'd take you. First Order's been looking for someone to rotate in. Hux and Phasma wouldn't go easy on you but you're good enough-- more than good enough. I'd train you myself, if you wanted.”

“I'd rather play with my friends,” she said, not looking at him as she finally took her own helmet off, strands of hair pulling away from her bun. It looked good on her. Ben caught himself thinking it and looked away.

“Well, if you do get knocked out, think about it,” he said, not even sure what he was offering or exactly why at this point. He'd train her? Him? He'd never offered to train another player personally in his entire career. “I could get you a membership.”

“But not Finn, right?” she demanded, stopping right next to the door solely for the purpose of squaring up to him. The effect was almost funny- she was so much shorter- but the force of her glare managed to make it just a little intimidating. “Not Finn or Han, even though they're both good, too.”

“You're better than either of them,” he pointed out, but that wasn't the answer she'd wanted so she huffed as she turned away, dodging through the exit as though to get free before he could say anything else. He followed slowly, nodding at an employee who said hi absently before catching himself. Hux and Phasma were waiting by the elevators, posted up against the wall.

“She got me,” Ben said, gesturing towards Rey, who was disappearing down the stairs with Finn. “Well, Finn winged me first and she finished the job.”

“We saw,” Hux said, gesturing up at the screens above them. Ben nodded, suddenly thankful that courses stopped broadcasting once the rounds were over. He didn't know how Hux and Phasma would react to finding out that he'd had a conversation with Rey in which he'd all but guaranteed her a spot in First Order, or that he'd also promised to handle her training. Somehow he thought that when they'd urged him to keep his eyes out for potential recruits someone from a team like the Rebellion wasn't what they'd had in mind. “I'm getting bored of this,” Hux said, glaring at the screens as the rankings changed, and Ben realized he hadn't ever checked the rankings after 9. He glanced up too; the Rebellion was still pulling ahead, with Han at 20, Finn at 16, and Rey still holding a solid 8. But the First Order had started putting in some work, especially in picking off the smaller players, and Ben had moved up to 23, Hux to 19, and Phasma to 17.

“Looking good, Phasma,” Ben commented, and Phasma stared at him then looked away, actually going a little shy at the unexpected compliment. He couldn't help but blink a couple times himself; first nodding at the employee, now this? What was happening to him?

“Well, it would have been higher without Finn getting me on 9,” Phasma said to the wall, the back of her neck going slightly pink under her white-blonde hair. “But thanks anyway.”

“I don't want to spend all damn day on the lower courses,” Hux complained loudly, since it had been at least thirty seconds since he'd ranted about something. “We're not getting any better chasing around a bunch of casuals who got lucky.”

“They might have gotten in with the raffle, but I think it's a bit more than luck at this point,” Ben pointed out. “They've been doing pretty damn well on the levels they've played so far, and that's with us after them on the last two, and me on the one before that. Even just by the numbers, the girl's wrecking every course she's on.”

“We should take her out first, then,” Hux decided. “We'll go by rankings on 11; the girl first, the traitor next, and Han last.”

“Pursue and destroy,” Phasma said, finally managing to look them in the eye again, crossing her arms across her chest. “I like it.”

Ben said nothing, suddenly uneasy. A strategy like this was a bit heavy-handed, even with the Rebels to deal with. All three of them, hunting down Rey at once? Even if they didn't get to Finn and Hux in time they'd eventually run her to the ground, especially on a course like 11, which was much more challenging than all the courses that came before it. She'd be having a difficult enough time adjusting to the new terrain without also having to try and evade the three best players in Tag Galaxy gunning for her.

“Ren has other ideas, I see,” Hux said, an unmistakable challenge to his tone as he gave Ben a flat glare.

“I don't think that will work as well on 10,” Ben said. “We could split 2:1 and leave someone in one part of the course, then herd the Rebels toward them. Since 11 has a separate upper level if we pursue them one at a time they'll have a much better chance of playing keep away until the clock runs down. If we have one person on the upper level and one on the lower, both playing in the same direction, it won't matter if they move up or down, they'll still run into one of us.”

“And who's volunteering to hold position on their own?” Hux asked, the sneer evident in his voice if not yet on his face. “Not you, I'm guessing.”

“I'll do it,” Ben said, shrugging. “I'm the most likely to be able to stay that long in one spot, and I'll draw the most players away from the rest of the course so the two of you can do your part.”

“That's true,” Phasma agreed. “If 11 is as stacked as 10 was, they'll be gunning for Ren most of all. We'll stand a better chance if he's stationary and we're mobile.”

Hux sighed gustily, thinking it over as though it was all his call, at the end of the day. “Let's see if it's stacked,” he said finally, pulling out his phone. Phasma and Ben glanced at each other, Ben intending to roll his eyes at Hux's attitude problem while Hux wasn't looking, but as soon as they made eye contact they seemed to simultaneously remember the odd compliment moment from before, and both quickly looked away again.

“It's even worse than 10,” Hux muttered, glaring at the screen. “AND there's a delay of game for injury.” He read on, then smiled in a very, very unpleasant way. “Looks like it's one of the Rebels.”

“Who?” Ben demanded immediately, thinking of Rey. She hadn't seem injured at all when she'd left the course, and he was sure he would have noticed, having spent time talking to her and walking back to the entrance with her. Finn? Han? No, he'd seen them both leave as well, and both had seemed fine at the time. Finn in particular had spent the last moments he'd had in Ben's company swearing at him, so if he'd been in some kind of pain or distress he had a funny way of showing it.

“Doesn't say,” Han said, scrolling down. “Just that it's the Rebel team holding things up. You'd think they'd just boot them, since they're raffle winners anyway and if they miss the round's usual starting time they're out for good. We could drop a hint to management,” he speculated, looking up at Phasma and Ben, that unpleasant smile still plastered across his face. “Suggest that in these circumstances, an injury shouldn't be permitted to get anyone special treatment.”

“Wouldn't they just get a trooper?” Phasma pointed out, even though she didn't look particularly opposed to the idea.

“Troopers aren't always available. They might all be busy today. We could all want to play separately, for instance,” he suggested. “Since it's a team round that means we'd all need two troopers apiece, and that's six employees that can't be spared. How many does Tag Galaxy usually keep on hand?”

“Hux, just play the damn game,” Ben said, folding his arms and frowning at him.

“There's ways to play and there's ways to play,” he said with a shrug. “I don't see why they should be allowed to delay an entire game just for one player.”

“This is the kind of underhanded shit I don't go along with and you know it,” Ben said, really and truly glaring at Hux now. He didn't usually let his least favorite teammate nettle him like this, but now Rey's accusation was coming back to him full force- 'this place isn't supposed to be just for people YOU like'- as though Ben was the one scheming to go behind opponents' backs and get them dropped, or disqualified, or kicked out of the building entirely. He was willing to play hard, sure, and maybe sometimes he went harder than he should, but it was different when it was just sheer skill. This was different, somehow. He could see Hux gearing up to say something cutting, his eyes narrowing in preparation, and braced himself, but before Hux could Phasma jumped in.

“I don't care about how we knock them out,” she said, looking at Hux, “but I want to get the traitor myself. And I want everyone to see it. And for that we need them on the course. Just one more time, Hux,” she added. “Make the whole damn building see it. Make them see how it goes after what he did to us.”

Hux considered this, then glanced at Ben. “You better be in position when we get them to you.”

Ben raised his eyebrows, knowing better than to act as though he'd won. That would only set Hux off again. Instead he settled for a shrug. “Where else would I be?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Original tumblr A/N: just sayin’ that Ben and Rey having a public conversation, ESPECIALLY one in which either or both partners is not particularly pleased with the other, during which random people are forced to walk back and forth between them as they go on, is so HanxLeia it hurts
> 
> My tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	7. Rey’s plan, Ben’s response

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey and Ben meet on the course again, and Rey surprises Ben

11 was an entirely different beast from the courses that had gone before it. 10 was supposedly where the jump in skill started, or so Tag Galaxy advertised, but 10 was just deliberately confusing and tiring. 11 was the kind of course that looked easy at first glance, but quickly revealed itself to be a genuine challenge. The main floor had no solid barriers, crisscrossed instead with rows of parallel rope netting, sturdy enough to climb but also easy enough to shoot through. If you did choose to climb you’d find yourself on 11’s elevated level, really a second floor, a hanging catwalk stretching the length and breadth of the room, the holes in the catwalk allowing for access between areas surrounded by nets on three sides to keep players from falling through. The ground floor was barely lit, and then only by blacklight; the catwalks weren’t lit at all.

Ben stayed by the entrance as Phasma and Hux moved off, Phasma taking the upper level, Hux taking the lower, watching them go and trying to decide where he wanted to position himself. He needed to be able to reach any part of this end of the course quickly and from either side, but he also needed to stay undercover for as long as possible. In the end he picked the rope net farthest left, where if he climbed to the highest point this side of the catwalks and kept his back to the wall he could stay hidden, see anyone who was coming, and protect most of his exposed sensors. The announcement rang out, thirty seconds ticked down, and weapons were freed.

For a few minutes no one was near Ben. He wasn’t too surprised; the first instinct of most players upon entering a course, especially a brand new one they’d never played before, was to get as far from the starting point as possible on the extremely flawed assumption that that was where most people would be just because that was where everyone HAD to be at some point. Of course, this meant everyone naturally bunched up into the same zone anyway, just in a different spot. Finally someone came through the nets toward him, searching, their mask on a swivel and their gun up, carefully skirting the holes leading above through which players on the catwalks could pick them off. Ben angled his gun carefully, trying to get a clear shot, but the edge of their mask protruded over their chest from his higher angle, preventing him from being able to target their chest plate.

Firing broke out on the catwalk level, running footsteps pounding loudly across the steel, and the player looked up reflexively, exposing their sensors. Ben took his chance, picking them off; a moment later two other players appeared, climbing down nearby nets to get away from whatever was going on upstairs, and he got them both mid-climb. It gave away his position just as another team headed his way on the ground floor, which was annoying, but he managed to get two out of three of them before they realized where he was. More players came, starting to spread out, trying to flank him, but he was side-on from most angles and the nets got in the way of their aim. By now they’d realized who he was, and a couple teams were working in coordination, forcing him back to the ground so he could strafe right before he was surrounded, picking them off with moderate efficiency but still probably looking at an eventual wipe out.

Pow. Pow. Pow. Someone was coming up behind the players distracted by him, taking advantage of their inattentiveness to easily pick them off. Suddenly the tables had turned; players made sounds of annoyance and disbelief as some reoriented, looking into the nets behind them. It was too late for one of them– pow- and he was out. Ben didn’t waste his chance in the general confusion, taking out several players in a row who were now paying too much attention to whoever was behind them and had forgotten who was in front of them. By the time he’d cleared everyone in his immediate range it seemed the ones at the back had already gotten theirs, only a few people wising up quickly enough to jump into a net and ascend to the catwalks and out of harm’s way.

Ben had ended up square in front of the exit and scanned the area for any new threats, ignoring the crowd of players with red chest and back plates filing past him, many not looking too happy about it, some favoring him with muttered imprecations about his parentage– if only they knew. Not until she was within three paces of him, her barrel aimed square at his chest plate, did Ben realize Rey was among them, using the crowd to hide her approach, her chest plate dark, still in the game.

“Truce,” she said.

“I don’t remember that working out well for you last time,” Ben remarked, raising his gun anyway. He didn’t have much choice; she’d gotten the drop on him, decisively so. “Thanks for the help.”

She said nothing to that, which surprised him; he thought she’d deny being the second player on the other side of the crossfire, or at least deny that she’d done it for him and insist she’d just been after the easy points. Not until she failed to comment on it did he rethink that assumption, finding himself wondering instead if he’d stumbled onto her actual motive by accident. “Oh, I see. You want to take me out yourself.”

She still said nothing for a moment, then she did something he’d never seen anyone do before; voluntarily, for no reason at all, she flipped her gun around in her hands and aimed it, point blank, at her own chest. “I will if you will,” she said, her gaze steady, the challenge inscrutable but clear.

“That’s a piss-poor excuse for a bluff,” he replied, lowering his gun slowly but to his side, not leveling it at her. He could; her certainly could and they both knew it. Holding her gun the way she was now, it was unlikely she’d be able to flip it back and pull the trigger in the time it would take him to level and pull his. She still held his gaze, unimpressed.

“I will if you will,” she repeated. “You seem to think you’re not the cheating prick everyone says you are. Prove it.”

He hesitated, sure she was serious and unable to decide how he felt about that. It was hard to see what advantage there could be in a voluntary self-shot when she could have just killed him and had done with it. Ben raised his gun slowly, non-aggressively, flipping it in his hands as she had, pressing the barrel to his chest. What guarantee did she have that he’d actually pull the trigger? She didn’t; if anything all the evidence pointed the other way. How much did he want to prove anything to this girl he barely knew, whatever she thought about him?

“On three?” she asked, not giving an inch, hands as steady with her gun to her own chest as they were when it was trained on his.

“Sure.” He had to admire her guts, if nothing else. But what a risk to take, and for no reason.

“1,” she started, holding his gaze, her own as hard as iron. “2. 3.”

Pow. The two shots went off at exactly the same moment, so close to one another that they sounded like one, and for a breath Ben almost thought she hadn’t gone through with it; then the chest plates lit up in tandem. Red. Fatal hits.

“You did it,” she said as they both lowered their guns, staring at him.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“You’re asking me?” he pointed out. “It was your idea.” She frowned, stepping past him towards the door then turning back to make sure he was following. He was, of course- he had to leave the course too and there was only one door, after all- and they exited one after another. Only once he saw the employees gaping at them did he remember that that particular inexplicable decision had been broadcast building-wide. Rey didn’t seem to notice the attention they were attracting, yanking off her mask as she headed to the elevators, punching the button to go down.

“What are you doing?” Ben asked, trailing after her, pulling off his mask as well.

“Going to concessions.” He snorted, reaching past her and hitting the button to go up.

“Member concessions,” he said in response to her look.

“I’m not a member.”

“You don’t have to be, you just have to be with one.” She glared at that- all she did was glare at him now, it seemed, with varying degrees of emotion and intensity- and when the two elevators arrived at the same time she boarded the one going down, turning to see, again, if he’d follow. He stared at her for a moment, unsure if he should, but just as the door began to close he made up his mind, catching it and slipping inside. They rode the elevator down in silence, Rey giving no explanation for this show of pique, not that Ben had expected one. The elevator doors opened on the main lobby and they stepped out.

Ben looked around, genuinely unable to remember when he'd last been to the main lobby. He never made it any farther than the front desk on this floor, diverting to the member’s entrance for years as if the public entrance didn’t exist. It was packed, of course, teeming with people of all ages, all shapes and sizes, a bevy of them wearing rented gear, another significant portion headed towards the gift shop to browse the ridiculous bright white Tag Galaxy brand gear. They made their way over to the gigantic and equally packed concessions area, getting in at the back of a line that stretched all the way down the seating section and almost into the main lobby itself. Ben didn’t say a word, able to tell by the stiff, unfriendly way Rey stood next to him that no commentary would be welcome at this juncture. They made it all the way to the counter in total silence, where an employee served them with narrowed eyes, taking in every detail of the transaction behind her Tag Galaxy mask. When Ben handed over his membership card to use the discount, ignoring Rey’s renewed glare at his temerity, the employee swiped it and gave Rey a deeply suspicious look while handing it back. Finally Rey noticed, giving the employee a puzzled look in return, but then their tray of food arrived before either could make an issue out of it and Rey and Ben went on their way.

“It’s because of us self-shotting on 11,” Ben explained calmly as they found two chairs wedged in between a table and a wall; terrible seats but there were very few available in the public concessions area this time of day. “We’ve been getting those looks since we left.”

“She’s working,” Rey pointed out, as though there was any way that would prevent a Tag Galaxy employee from watching the screens. Ben shrugged, climbing into his seat and focusing on his loaded nachos. Nothing kept the employees and troopers from gossiping, and certainly nothing as comparatively unimportant as doing their actual jobs or, laser gods forbid it, improving their atrocious aim. Rey took the seat next to his and they ate in silence for a while as he glanced around, but fortunately their seatmates on the other sides of the table seemed to be all casuals and ignored Ben and Rey completely.

“So, are you going to explain?” he asked after a long few minutes during which he waited for her to speak but she ignored him completely, devouring her cotton candy-flavored ice cream with single minded intent. She didn’t look up at him now either, addressing her ice cream instead.

“I thought we should talk.”

“You could have just found me in between rounds.”

“I didn’t want to deal with your friends,” she said snippily, taking another bite of ice cream.

“What are we going to talk about, then?” he asked, genuinely curious. It was hard to imagine what kind of conversation they could possibly have that would be worth all this trouble, especially when Rey now seemed so determined to make some performative art piece out of disliking him. She provided no clarification either, sucking on her ice cream spoon and still not looking at him. “How did you meet Finn?” he asked after another minute of this.

“At Millennium Falcon. He came over when he got kicked out of here, and I just started working there, so we’re kind of new together.”

“No wonder you want a membership here so badly,” Ben muttered, taking out his phone as it buzzed, a novelty since there was rarely anyone trying to call him who wouldn’t already know the three or four places he might be. Of course Hux- for it was Hux- would never expect to find Ben down here. Ben put the phone on silent and shoved it back in his pocket.

“I love Falcon,” Rey said staunchly, finally looking at Ben for the sole purpose of frowning at him head-on. “Han’s teaching me how to play. He says I’m not bad.”

“You’re very good. But you could be better.”

“Why do you hate us?” she asked again, her expression speculative now rather than antagonistic, which made for a change.

“I don’t hate you. I told you that already.”

“Okay, why do you hate Finn and Han?”

He looked away, chasing some nacho cheese around his plate for a moment with one last chip fragment. “What have they told you?”

“More than enough. I know all about you, Kylo Ren.”

“Yeah?” he said, glancing back at her.

“Mm-hm,” she said, with so much confidence he almost wondered how much she did know. Of course, even if they were feeling particularly chatty there was only so much Han and Finn could tell her.

“But you wanted to talk to me anyway.”

She frowned, looking down at her ice cream container, now empty. Ben’s phone was lighting up in his pocket, soundless but still insistent, and if he didn’t get back to his team soon they would eventually start asking around to discover where he’d gone. Somehow he didn’t want them to find him here, in first floor concessions, with the Rebel girl. It wasn’t just that he honestly didn’t know how they’d react- though there was definitely a question mark there- but more that he’d rather keep it to himself for a change. There wasn’t much he kept to himself these days, really, but Rey, and her curiosity and her opinions and her made-up mind, seemed separate from Tag Galaxy in some way, even though he’d only ever known her here. And he kind of liked that.

“I have to get back to the First Order,” he said, standing and automatically collecting their used food containers, dumping them in a trash can that was close to hand and stacking the now-empty tray on top.

“Already?” Rey asked, struggling to get up. Her chair was wedged so tightly into the table she practically had to climb out.

“Yes,” he answered, grabbing his mask and gun. “But here’s a question for you, Rey-who-knows-everything; do you know my name?” He could immediately see from her face she did not but still wanted to press the advantage so he added pointedly, “My real name.”

“No,” she was forced to admit, frowning again.

“It’s Ben Solo,” he said, enjoying her stunned expression just before he turned away, deliberately leaving her hanging. He could hear he coming after him as he wove through the crowds, hastily apologizing as she pushed past one person after another, but he was much bigger than her and others naturally made a path when he wanted through, whereas she was so small they generally didn’t notice she was right there until they tripped over her. He made it to the elevators before her easily, veering right towards a door with a keycard scanner marked ‘Members Only’.

“Wait!” Rey protested, just as Ben scanned his pass and pushed the door open, hard on his heels.

“You can’t come in here,” he told her, turning and gesturing towards the sign.

“Wait,” she insisted again, pushing back against the door with one hand so it wouldn’t shut on her. “Ben Solo? Like– like Han Solo?”

“Well, not very much like, hopefully,” Ben said, rolling his eyes as he pushed her hand out of the way. “But yeah. He’s my father.” He didn’t know exactly why he told her that- or anything at all- but at this point maybe it was just for the satisfaction of seeing her stare after him with an expression of mingled confusion and defiance as the door swung shut. Ben allowed himself the briefest moment of satisfaction before turning away and heading towards the locker room. So. Maybe there was more to the story after all, Rey. Just maybe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Original tumblr A/N: they don’t mean to be such a dramatic couple I think, but at the same time here they are, already pulling of laser tag suicide pacts just to talk to each other. My my ~ ~
> 
> My tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	8. Hux targets Rey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hux decides to be the one to take Rey down during this round

Hux and Phasma were seriously pissed when they found Ben in the member's locker room getting out of the shower, a quick rinse he'd needed after the humid Level 10 and hadn't had the time for until now. Hux swore he'd checked the men's side of the showers up and down but was quickly distracted by the main event; chewing Ben out for the dumbass decision to actually self-shot, which despite being in round himself at the time he'd heard about from the employees afterward, of course.

“Look, you're the one who said we she focus on going after the girl because she's got the highest rank,” Ben pointed out, rubbing a towel over his hair to dry it. “She offered to self-shot if I did and it got her out of the way.”

“Because you weren't in position we lost both of the others!” Hux raged. “We could have cornered Finn and Poe exactly like we planned--.”

“Poe?!” Ben demanded, lowering the towel to look at him. “What do you mean, Poe? He's here now?”

“Yes, Poe's here now, which you would have known if you'd been on the course when we were flushing him out towards where you were supposed to be!” Hux continued to scream, his face gone sallow again, the noise bouncing unpleasantly off the tile walls. “Poe took Han's place between 10 and 11, he's playing with the Rebels!” Ben couldn't help but swear at that himself, loudly and comprehensively, throwing his towel towards the dirty towel basket with such force it slapped loudly against the wall before falling inside.

“Whenever you boys are done deafening the rest of us!” Phasma called from where she was waiting impatiently outside. Ben kept swearing but dragged his shirt on over his head, then buckled his chest- and backplates in place; only then did it occur to him how Poe had gotten in with the Rebels in the first place.

“Wait, Han's the one who was injured?” he demanded, turning to Hux, who was already leading the way back into the locker room. “I took him out myself, I saw him leave, he was fine.”

“It wasn't a real injury, obviously, Ren,” Hux snarled as they reunited with Phasma, standing away from the wall she'd been leaning on, looking peeved that they'd kept her waiting. “They needed time to pull the switch and you can't delay the game just to change your roster. While YOU were busy being all high and mighty about following the rules to the letter THEY were faking an injured player and breaking every rule in the book!”

“Huh,” was all Ben said, taking that in.

“We need to knock them out at 12 so we can go back to playing on the REAL courses,” Hux continued to storm. “And since nothing else seems to be working we're splitting and going back to full man-to-man.”

“You sure you can take Poe?” Ben asked. The question had been sincere but he'd momentarily forgotten who he was talking to-- Hux went, if it was possible, even more pale, so much so that his red hair stood out against his skin like it was snow.

“I'm taking Poe,” Phasma said before Hux could rip Ben's throat out, which it looked very, very likely he was about to do. “I'm bored going after the traitor, and Ren's been going about half-and-half with the girl, even after the self-shot.”

“I'll handle the girl this time, actually,” Hux said, staring at Ben as though daring him to dispute it. “At least I won't duck the round and foul the whole game up.”

Ben looked back at him, not sure whether to take the bait or not. Rey was good enough to take Hux on a normal day, but Hux in this mood was likely to try and pull something nasty that she wouldn't expect. Then again it turned out she was just as comfortable with rule-breaking as she kept accusing everyone else of being, so maybe she wouldn't be too caught off guard after all.

“Fine,” Ben said at last, looking away. “Let's go, then.”

The day was beginning to feel long, he realized as they rode up in the elevator to 12, all of them silent. Usually Ben only played a few rounds a day, spacing them out generously, cruising Starkiller every now and again when someone was up for it. This round-after-round-after-round format, which in all honesty was what he was supposed to be doing regularly as his part of First Order training, was wearing on him, especially when it was on a variety of courses instead of just one or two. He wondered how Rey was doing, having started on 1 and worked all the way up here in a single day, then stopped himself. First of all, she was clearly doing extremely well, if her actual performance was anything to judge by. Second of all, it really shouldn't matter to him either way.

They entered the level and split up immediately, no one looking at anyone else. 12 was another difficult course, divided into five sections by six parallel corridors that ran the length of the room, doors and windows spaced at regular intervals. The windows overlooked evenly spaced segments separated out by crosswise barriers that made excellent cover but forced you to climb over them to get anywhere, exposing yourself both to anyone in that hallway and anyone who sighted you through the windows. The five wide spaces in between the corridors were left open entirely, killing grounds that were almost impossible to cross. It was a course that could be handled well if you worked within your team and had a decent strategy focusing on communication and coordination, so of course they were just going to go in and do whatever. Ben headed for the nearest corridor on his left to check the end slot, the best place to camp on this course if you wanted a defensible position; this one was occupied by two players already but since the round hadn't started yet they were sitting on the ground talking and not paying attention to anyone taking position near them. Ben took the spot two barriers down and settled in to wait. Before long the start of round announcement played, then the countdown as the general lights went out and the round lights came on, corridors lit to blazing by twin rows of uninterrupted fluorescent lights, killing grounds left dark. The countdown ended. Weapons freed.

Ben turned immediately, wasting no time as he went up and over the barricade behind him, landing on the other side of the last barrier from his quarry. 12 was where custom gear began to tell the difference; if you had a sturdy enough chestplate you could slide over the tops of barricades sideways, exposing neither your front nor back sensors when you moved. Rented gear couldn't handle the weight or the grinding motion and nearly always popped one or two sensors; Ben's could handle both. The players opposite him weren't expecting someone to move on them so aggressively so soon, and only managed to dazzle him as they shot as his head helplessly, his chestplate hidden behind the barrier as he took them both out and went up and over one more time, claiming their spot.

“Goddammit, Ren!” one of the players snapped, shedding his mask so he could glare at Ben with full impact. “Why is the First Order even down this far anyway?”

“We got beef,” Ren said briefly, taking out someone trying to cross the killing ground. The shadows didn't help them nearly as much as they'd thought they would; his shot was right on target. “It's not with you.”

“Yeah, well it may as well be! You got us on 10 too, and Phasma got us on 11!”

“Sucks to suck,” Ben said unfeelingly without turning around, checking his lines of sight. No one seemed particularly interested in him at the moment other than the dead players at his back, one of whom was still growling about something explicit and anatomically unlikely. Fortunately by then an employee was already coming to retrieve them, calling out about leaving a round once you'd been hit and not taking your mask off on an active course, and the players were finally ousted.

For a moment the middle two corridors were unusually quiet. The real fight at the moment was happening on the far side corridors, the even more defensible positions where the corridors were flush against hard walls and if you managed to get an end spot you only had to watch two lines of sight instead of three. Ben kept careful watch of his area anyway, noting the two separate players holed up in the middle barriers of the corridor, only one space separating them, each eyeing the other nervously. At the far end the position had also been taken by two players together, and even at this distance Ben noticed the distinctive red, black, and silver mask of the one on the left.

Poe. Ben frowned, leaning back against the wall as someone came at him from his right-hand window, shooting back at them one-handed so he wouldn't have to turn their way and expose his chestplate. It skewed his shot slightly up and right but it still hit enough to take them out. Poe had trained at another course years and years ago, and after Ben left he'd heard Poe had come over to Falcon to train with his mother, who was herself a decent shot even though she didn't often take the course personally and hadn't played pro for as long as Ben could remember. Now Poe had apparently become the favorite surrogate son, one who liked to cruise Tag Galaxy once in a while just to be annoying, which he certainly was. Ben had put him down a time or two but mostly just avoided him, not interested in getting involved, so Poe mostly just ended up tweaking Hux's nose. In any other case Ben hardly minded that but today, seeing him with Rey and Finn, knowing that if they won they'd all have memberships here; well that was a hefty bit of extra motivation to finish this.

A miniature firefight broke out in the middle of their corridor as the two players bogged down in the barricades there decided to play last-man-standing. The one nearer Ben succeeded in taking out the other, then Ben instantly picked off the survivor. At the far end Poe and Finn were hard-pressed, taking fire from both sides at once, and just as Ben lined up on Poe in case he exposed his sensors, wondering if he could hit him at this distance, Rey flitted through the corridor. It was a brief interruption- she was using one of the doors through from one killing ground to the other, right to left- but Poe noticed, glancing up. Ben squeezed the trigger automatically and Poe's chestplate lit up red just as Hux passed through the corridor as well, trailing Rey. It was surprising he was even still alive, given how difficult it was to survive this course while staying mobile. Ben pressed up to his left-hand window, watching as Rey slid through into the next corridor over, jumping a barricade and getting under cover. Hux stopped next to the window, his back flat to the wall, waiting his moment. It was clear she hadn't seen him; out of the corner of his eye Ben saw another chestplate light up red at the end of his own corridor and knew Finn had been hit.

Hux made his move but Rey made hers just a moment before, going up and over two barriers in quick succession, moving farther down her corridor in the opposite direction from where Ben was hidden in his; Hux's shots went wide. For a moment Ben was forced to turn away as another player came for him, not quickly enough to keep them from getting under cover one space away. It was exactly the same move Ben had pulled at the beginning of the game, so when the player moved again Ben went through the left-hand window before he got taken out, heading up the side of the corridor, keeping to the shadows. Except for Hux, too intent on Rey to notice Ben far down the killing ground, no one else was there at the moment. Ben crossed at speed, through the corridor Rey was in and out the other side, ducking into the shadows once again. He glanced through a window, risking exposing his chest, to see Rey was moving again, Hux following. At this rate she'd definitely be caught; she was nearly to the end and Hux was already against the corridor's side.

Pow. Ben ducked down instinctively as he took fire from somewhere in front of him, a player appearing in the corridor across the killing ground he was in now, probably survivors from the firefight alert for stragglers. At the same time Rey came through the window and into his killing ground farther up, not noticing him as she streaked across, low and fast, into the next corridor and over a barricade. Laser fire greeted her from the same part of the corridor that had shot at Ben but Rey was smart and had already learned to go over sideways, so there was nothing to hit.

The round must be getting close to over, Ben thought as he ducked back into the corridor at his back, down a couple barricades, then out the other side. Things were still quiet over here, too; whatever players had pressed Finn and Poe had moved on to other targets. Ben glanced through the corridor he was now pressed against to the next one over, watching as Hux began to corner Rey again. This time he was on it, watching Rey too closely for her to get out the other side the same way she had before; at this rate she'd be taken out as long as Hux had the time to do it. Ben deliberately didn't wear a watch- none of the First Order did, wanting to train themselves to know instinctively how long thirty minutes was- but in situations like this it would have been an advantage to know what the game clock said down to the second. Finn and Poe were already out; when Hux got Rey that would finish the Rebels for good. They'd head back to the Falcon to lick their wounds and that would be the end of that. Ben was all but unsurprised to realize it wasn't a victory that particularly appealed to him. He'd almost wanted the Rebels to get all the way to the pro levels at this point, just to see how they handled them. How she handled them. But when Hux took her out it'd be game over.

Movement caught Ben's eye and he glanced up to see Hux reaching around his back with his free hand. When it emerged, kept carefully at his side, there was a second laser gun in it.

Damn him! Ben growled, ducking back down into the shadows of his own killing ground, checking to make sure no one was sneaking up on him unexpectedly. For the moment the majority of the fire on the course was centered far right and he seemed to be in the clear. Ben looked back through his window as Hux inched toward where Rey was hidden. He planned to double-shot her for twice the ranking points. It wasn't technically illegal but it was heavily frowned upon, and Ben personally thought it was just a cheap trick meant to inflate scores beyond the actual skill of their owner.

Laserfire broke out again on his right, closer this time. The killing grounds were too dark to have cameras; the feed coming from 12 was all corridors. Ben leaned out and away from the wall, sighting along his barrel. If he moved quickly and straight right, there'd be no clear lines of sight to see who had taken the shot.

Rey went up and over the last barricade, towards the end spot where Hux would corner her. Hux didn't waste a second, leaning out to target her at the same time, both guns extended. Pow. His backplate lit up red.

Ben ducked away instantly, straight across the dark killing ground and into the next corridor then out of it faster than a camera would be able to follow, straight into the firefight on that side, leaving his back- and chestplate wide open. Pow. He was hit almost immediately, as planned, his chestplate lighting up red as some other player crowed in delight, realizing who they'd taken out. Ben smiled under his mask where no one would see. Looked like this just wasn't the First Order's day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All these laser tag mechanics I've made up for this story may make their way into real life-- believe it or not the pro laser tag circuit in real life (what there is of one) doesn't have a standardized ranking system, and now I've made a friend who wants to use mine O.O Strange happenings these days, lovely readers
> 
> My tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	9. Ben gives Rey some tips, and some answers too

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Between rounds Ben and Rey find a way to see each other

Concessions at 16 was slowly emptying as pro players geared up for the next round. First Order had been asked a few times if they were going to get in on this one, most of the pro's not having found out yet about the ongoing feud with the Rebels; Ben and Phasma had to be the ones to say they were sitting it out, since Hux was sulking furiously on the other side of their table, his pretzel untouched. He'd insisted to Ben and Phasma at least a dozen times that he'd nearly had the Rebel girl, that he'd been so close, but now that portion of his tantrum had run its course and he had to settle for glowering at anyone who came near.

“Maybe I should take her,” Phasma speculated, then added hurriedly, “just so we all have a shot at it,” when Hux glowered even harder in her direction.

“I'm taking her,” he ground out, in a tone meant to suggest the matter was beyond discussion. Ben said nothing, keeping his eyes slanted toward the elevators as he watched the round feeds with pretended interested. “Ren?” Hux prompted.

“What?” Ben said, looking around.

“I'm taking the girl next round.”

“Full man-to-man again?” Ben sighed, picking up his soda.

“Yes.”

“On 13?” Ben pointed out.

“Yes,” Hux insisted mulishly. Ben shook his head and went back to watching the feeds; if 12 was difficult without a team, 13 was practically non-functional. They'd be slaughtered.

“Ren might have a point,” Phasma said, risking Hux's wrath. “Does it really matter who--.”

“It matters!” Hux snapped out, slapping the table for emphasis, making all of their food jump. Phasma's soda nearly tipped over and she had to grab for it; Ren watched the spectacle unemotionally, glad his was already in his hand. “I was an inch away from her if that, if some rando hadn't gotten off a lucky shot the Rebels would be packing their gear right now!”

“Yeah, well I was an inch away from the traitor on the last one!” Phasma snapped back, finally ruffled by Hux's mood. “We need to play a tight, controlled game, not go pinging around the course on our own! Everyone else is ACTUALLY playing as a team, no wonder we keep getting knocked out.”

Ben's phone lit up in his pocket and he fished it out as Phasma and Hux continued to argue, wondering who could possibly be trying to get hold of him that wasn't either of his teammates. It was a notification from Tag Galaxy; someone wanted a short round. He was hardly in the mood but he clicked through to see who it was, curious. The invitation was for Level 8, and it was from Rey.

“I'll meet you at 13,” he told Hux and Phasma, shoving his phone back into his pocket as he stood, grabbing his gear. “Sort this shit out, will you? If we go in the same way we did in 12 it's going to be worse than the last time.”

“Easy to say when you're ducking out to hide in the locker room again,” Hux sneered, but Ben shrugged, ignoring the jab as he left, taking the elevator down to Level 8. The course where they'd first met, come to think of it. She was waiting for him in the empty lobby, her gun at her side, and he glanced at it, wishing he could use it again just once. It seemed more unlikely than ever from the way she frowned at him.

“Didn't think you'd come,” was all she said, starting towards the entrance where one employee waited on his own, looking bored. Short rounds were filler for levels in between actual rounds, usually more training sessions or duels than real games, and therefore uninteresting across the board. They weren't even on the live feed, for which Ben was very grateful at this particular moment.

“How many lives?” Ben asked Rey as they entered.

“Five.”

“Five?” he repeated, nonplussed. Short rounds were only ten or fifteen minutes long, and in that space of time it was damn hard to kill someone even just three times with the whole course to play, much less five.

“You can't do it?” she threw out the challenge, glancing at him over her shoulder.

“Not against you,” he answered honestly as the lights went down and the round lights started up, dizzying strobes splashing every surface with bright color. At least there was no smoke in short rounds. “Against a casual, maybe, but I don't know why I'd waste the time.”

“You don't really have a chill setting, do you?”

“No.”

“So, what are the best spots on this course?” she asked, stopping in the center of the area.

“The best spots for what?” he asked, noticing their weapons were already free. He shot her backplate experimentally and got a glare for his trouble.

“What are we doing, exactly?” he asked as the red shot faded, showing she had to take at least one more fatal hit to be knocked out.

“Practicing,” she said unexpansively.

“For what?”

“I thought you said you wanted to.”

He stared at her a moment before he realized. “Am I training you right now?” She shrugged, moving her gun from where it had been propped against her shoulder to both hands. He took that as a yes, which was a bit bemusing but now hardly seemed the time to clarify things. The game clock was running down and he had no guarantee Hux and Phasma wouldn't decide to go looking for him again even if they had seem fairly settled in at concessions when he'd left. “Okay, this course has elevated levels around the sides but the elevations are minor and their lines of sight aren't usually good enough to give you much more advantage than being on the ground unless you're gunning for someone specific that you know is near you,” he said, gesturing towards the lower barriers and abbreviated hallways that surrounded them. “8 is still general audience so it's designed to let you camp or move, but if you camp in the short barriers you'll eventually get targeted by someone behind you taking potshots. So if you want to camp you need to take one of the hallways and hold it, if you're with a team, or get into the hallways and move occasionally when you get pressed, if you're on your own.”

“Do you ever play on your own?” she asked.

“Often,” he said shortly. “Almost always dueling rounds. Last man standing gets old on a course; it's too big and if the other player goes on the run it takes forever.”

“But you never go on the run?”

“If there's a reason. There's usually not. Now shoot me,” he said, gesturing to his chestplate. She looked at him, unsure what he meant. “Go on,” he prompted. She raised her gun quickly, as if she thought he was going to dodge, but he stayed exactly where he was. Pow. His chestplate lit up red and faded again. “Now we're even.” She stared for a moment, frowning as usual.

“Everyone says you're the biggest dick on the course,” she told him in a hard, matter-of-fact tone as she lowered the gun again.

“So I hear.”

“You don't seem like it though.”

How generous of her. “In my personal opinion it's probably Hux,” Ben said. “I don't know how anyone else could ever be the biggest dick on the course when he's around. You need to tighten up your stance when you're in cover.”

“But you play with him anyway?” she asked, still following as he gestured for her to go behind a short barrier.

“You get up too early when you're shooting or preparing to move,” he said, ignoring her question as he got behind a barrier across from hers. How could he ever possibly explain why he spent time with Hux? Where would he even start? “You rely too much on keeping your shoulders straight for aim and it forces your torso up. If you need to use your shoulders angle your torso down and your chin up, like a diver. It tucks your chestplate and keeps your sensors out of harm's way.”

“What about Phasma?” Rey asked, trying the pose. It worked exactly as Ben had said it would and the leading edge of her chestplate disappeared safely below his line of sight. “Is she a dick too?”

“Not as much or as often. Are we training or talking, Rey?” She frowned but said nothing, and he gestured. “Now transition between one barrier and another starting with that stance. I'll try to hit you as you go. Keep your sensors and where they're vulnerable in mind at all times.”

From then on she let him focus on the game but he could tell even behind her mask that she was nowhere near through with her questions and resigned himself to that. How she even had the energy to do a short round after twelve full rounds in a row he couldn't guess; she seemed to run mostly on stubbornness and sheer luck. He didn't try to push her but didn't go easy on her either, and when the round timed out and the lights came up Rey had at least gotten some useful pointers to start working on her bad habits, if nothing else.

“Why won't you tell me anything about yourself?” she asked as they left, shedding their masks.

“Hux was the person I started training with when I first got here,” Ben said with a shrug. “He's good, when he's not distracted by his need to either show everyone up or screw them over. Phasma's actually very, very good. We make a decent team overall.”

“But do you LIKE playing with them?” Rey stressed as they got to the elevators and both hesitated.

“I need a team and they're the best one here. Are you going to 13 right away?”

“No. Finn and Poe are down in concessions.”

“What did they think of this?”

“They don't know,” Rey said, frowning again. That surprised him-- he didn't know why she'd feel the need to hide it, unless she assumed they'd react badly to thinking he was trying to poach her, which he certainly was. “What about your awesome teammates?”

“They don't know either. Are you going to go pro, Rey?”

“I'm thinking about it,” she muttered, looking away. “I like the game but it just seems like there's a ton of bullshit that comes with it.”

“It doesn't have to be that way all the time,” Ben promised, ignoring the metric ton of bullshit he'd personally had to deal with today alone. “Once you get to pro's and spend some time there it's pretty okay.”

“Tempting,” she commented sarcastically, a smile tugging at her lips. “Why'd you leave Millennium Falcon, Ben?”

It was his turn to frown, looking away as he punched the up button. “It's ancient history.”

“Is it?” she pressed. “You said you still had hard feelings about your dad.”

'Hard feelings'. Like... like maybe they'd had an argument once upon a time about Ben mowing the lawn and he still hadn't gotten over it. Like Han had been hard on him about his clothes or his haircut and Ben had written some emo poetry about it then run away in the night. “It wasn't just Han,” he admitted. “My whole family wanted me to go pro, but on their terms. If you think I'm the one who doesn't have a chill setting you must not know them very well. Have you met Luke?”

“Luke Skywalker? No,” she said. “He's your uncle right?”

“Yeah. They had him training me, when I was a kid. Like, a little, little kid. He had his own course, then. It all went to hell pretty quickly.”

“What do you mean, Ben?” Rey asked in a tone that worried him. There was something prescient in it, something that signaled she was starting to get an idea of where this could be going and might actually want to know, might in some way care, and he had no idea what to do with that. The elevator arrived while he was still figuring out if he should answer or not and he got on, turning back around.

“I know you have questions but this isn't stuff I talk about,” he said, unable, somehow, to look away from her. She wasn't glaring anymore, which was a start, but really he shouldn't hope for too much. “You're the best player I've seen in a long time, but there's still plenty you need to learn.”

“But Luke's the best player there ever was,” Rey insisted, sticking a hand out to keep the elevator door from closing just as it started to, her brown eyes stuck on his like there was a charge between them, keeping them there. “I'd kill for him to train me.”

“He wouldn't even if you asked him. He hasn't trained anyone since his course was shut down; I doubt he even remembers where he put his gun.”

“What happened, Ben?”

“I'll see you on 13, Rey.” She hesitated a long moment, as though waiting for him to change his mind and give her the whole saga right here in this elevator, but he stayed silent and eventually she withdrew her hand, letting the door slide shut. The moment the elevator started to rise Ben sighed, leaning against the back wall. There was a part of him- a disconcertingly insistent part of him- that wanted to go after her and tell her anything she wanted to know, as if it might change her mind, as if then she would actually stay. But no one knew the whole story except Luke, Ben himself, and Snoke, since it wasn't as though he could have just shown up on his new sponsor's doorstep out of the clear blue sky without an explanation. Without Snoke-- no, it wasn't worth thinking about. He shook his head at himself, annoyed that all of this was coming up, that she was dragging all of this up. He just needed to keep his head straight and play the game, as he always had. Outside of that there really wasn't much worth thinking about. But her eyes stayed with him somehow, the way they'd locked with his as she'd waited for him to go on, concerned, expectant, giving him a chance to tell someone his side of things. He wondered if she'd ask for another short round after 13; assuming the Rebels survived 13, of course. Even if they didn't, he wondered if she'd ask anyway. He'd go, if she did. He'd definitely be there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this is why I don't do AU, lol-- it's so hard to know how to slot everything in and make it match up in a way that's true to the original source material, but also keeps to the theme of this completely new and different setting! Working on it, guys. Working on it
> 
> My tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	10. A rebellion reaches the First Order

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dissension in the ranks

“Because we don't fucking want to, that's why,” Hux said, glaring at Ben across his crossed arms.

“Are you really going to keep being pissy about this?” Ben demanded, knowing what he was starting, for once not caring at all. Ducking out of a round they'd already signed up for was just not how the First Order played, especially in these circumstances, but he'd come back to find both Hux and Phasma determined to do just that.

“If they make it to the pro levels we'll see them there.”

“Phasma?” Ben asked, turning towards her.

“We can take a round off, Ren,” she said, arms also crossed, frowning away from them. “If we're lucky someone might even pick them off for us.”

“OR we could just take 13 as a team, which is what we're supposed to be.”

“Says the player who can't stand to actually train as part of the First Order, and only plays as part of the First Order when it's convenient to him,” Hux said, leaning forward against the table. “How many times have you gone off on your own, or just decided to do whatever you wanted, or completely ghosted when you were supposed to be here? You want to yell at us about team playing? You've forced us to grab a trooper to fill out our roster over and over again!”

“Ren, let's just wait and see if they even make it to 14,” Phasma sighed, rolling her eyes but still not looking at either of them. “We're all at each other's throats about this and I'm sick of it.”

“The round's stacked anyway, even without us there,” Hux contributed. “The Praetorians are in on this one, both sets, and they know the Rebels are the ones to beat.”

Ben turned away, partly to hide his frown, partly to check the cameras. 13 had only just started but neither of his teammates were going to budge, and he couldn't take the round without them. Even with troopers, and even assuming the troopers were good- which they weren't- he needed an actual team to survive 13.

“Going to go after them on your own?” Hux asked sarcastically behind him.

“No,” Ben said shortly.

“I'm sure you're good enough to take 13 by yourself. Go ahead. See how that works out for you.” Ben didn't reply, watching the screens. 13 was plenty smoky today and it wasn't easy to make out what was going on, but the blue shot gun should be hard to miss. If anything the smoke should make it more obvious, but he hadn't managed to spot it yet. “I don't know why you would stay up here with us instead,” Hux continued. “You could be shooting whole birthday parties in the back, or cornering high school youth groups.”

“You could be double-shotting players who out-rank you because you can't beat them any other way,” Ben replied. The silence that fell behind him was condemning, and he could all but feel Hux's eyes on the back of his neck.

“Hux, come on,” Phasma finally said. “You're not pulling that shit today are you?”

“No, Ren's just being a bigger dick than usual.”

“So that wasn't a second gun I saw hidden behind your backplate on 12?” Ben asked, turning around and giving Hux a look easily as condemning as the daggers Hux was staring at him. “I imagined the whole thing?”

“I didn't use it,” Hux pointed out.

“Is that why you wanted to be the one to go after Rey so badly? Because she's ranked so high and you wanted to make sure you got twice the kill for yourself?”

“We don't need him to tell us, let's find out,” Phasma said, holding out a hand towards Hux expectantly. “Give me your phone and let me check your Tag Galaxy app. We'll see if you've got more than one gun registered.” There was a long, tense moment where Hux tried to stare down both of them at once, his expression haughty and defiant, but didn't reach for his phone, keeping his arms firmly crossed against his chest.

“It's not against the rules,” Hux insisted, finally looking away from them.

“Goddammit, Hux,” Phasma swore.

“If it knocks them out who cares how it happens?” he said, rolling his eyes, which must have been mostly for effect because Ben couldn't imagine Hux thought either he or Phasma would be very impressed by this show of disinterest. If anything Phasma seemed even angrier, and for a moment Ben thought she might actually start yelling but instead she shook her head sharply, standing and grabbing her gear, storming to the elevators.

“You're lucky,” Ben remarked, standing as well. “I thought she was going to punch you, but it looks like she's going after an actual punching bag instead.”

“You're such a dick, Ren,” Hux said bitterly, leaning back in his chair, frowning at the table. “It doesn't matter how we win as long as we do, that's how competition works! Your ranking isn't all clean either, you know. Every time the First Order wins it boosts you, too. But keep pretending you're really as good as you think you are!” he called after Ben as Ben turned away. “When even that Rebel girl can kick your ass any time she wants!”

Since Phasma was already taking the elevator Ben turned toward the stairwell, sensing she wouldn't like the company and not very much in the mood for company either, his grip on his gun and mask iron as he took the stairs two at a time. Maybe Hux's general assholishness wouldn't have pissed him off so easily if he hadn't JUST come from talking to Rey about the necessary evils of playing with him and Phasma. To be fair Phasma wasn't nearly as bad but she had a habit of going along with whatever Hux was doing that just emboldened him and made him worse and worse, to the point where even she was getting tired of it. Maybe she'd thought that being in the best team in Tag Galaxy would be enough for him, that surely once they'd decimated every other team and player in the rankings he'd calm down a bit, but that wasn't what was happening. He was still pulling the same stunts, still going behind other player's backs, still excusing it with technicalities and loopholes.

Ben had intended to head straight for the locker room and maybe punch something himself but as he reached Level 13 he hesitated, turning that way. He couldn't go into a round this late, and couldn't solo a team round anyway, but at least the screens in the lobby would be showing 13 exclusively. He ducked out into the sparsely populated area, the employees ignoring him as they watched the game too on their own screens just next to the entry, waiting for players to get knocked out to see if they'd have to go after them for not leaving the course quickly enough. The few players who had already been knocked out focused on the screens too as they waited around for their teammates to either make it through or join them, and Ben found a spot at the back of the room and was summarily and gratifyingly ignored as he settled in to watch.

13 was a mess. A tight course from the start, it had been at capacity when the First Order had been in the line-up and didn't fare much better for having three less players to contend with. Fortunately both of the Praetorian's three player teams had gotten pinned down early, making the mistake of taking a defensive position that left them little option but to camp, while the Rebels were in a similar position but across the course. Colored laser shots flew thick and fast, lighting up the smoke, but Rey's gun was still obvious every time she pulled the trigger, bigger, brighter, the broad shots punching through to player after player. It was hard to see her where she was crouched behind her short barrier but it seemed she was in the stance Ben had shown her, chest angled down, chin angled up, keeping her sensors covered. He smiled, leaning against a wall as he watched.

He'd intended to spend the round furious about Hux, furious at Phasma, fuming somewhere he wouldn't be bothered and waiting impatiently for it to be time to line up for 14. But watching someone else's game- really watching, for once, a game in which he was not a participant- he found himself distracted in the best possible way. That was the relief of Rey the Rebel, someone separate from everything else, someone who wasn't caught up in the exhausting production of the First Order, day in and day out, in Hux's constant derision for everyone else and insistence that being the best was more important than anything, in Phasma's drive to just play the game whatever way they could and ignoring what was right or wrong whenever it suited her, in Snoke's--.

Ben shook his head, stopping his train of thought there. He was very lucky to have a sponsor at all, much less someone who had been willing to sponsor him to this extent. Where else could he have gone, after what had happened? Who would have taken him in? If he hadn't known Snoke by then, if he hadn't already had the offer, he really would have been trapped. He turned his attention back to the screen, making himself focus, trying to pick out Rey's shots as she knocked one player down after another who tried to come after her. Finn and Poe were very good too- Finn with the benefit of intensive First Order training to fall back on, Poe with a cocky attitude that seemed to somehow substitute for luck- but they were nowhere as brilliant as Rey. Whatever her ranking was now... but that was another thing, he hadn't checked the rankings, again. Usually he kept them in mind at all times but today he'd gotten into the habit of barely looking the screen over. He leaned to one side, checking the screens above the elevators, searching the list. Then straightened up, staring.

The Rebellion was behind now, but only because Poe was ranked 41 since he'd just arrived and was still on his second round of the day; he might be able to take Han's spot on the roster but there was no picking up where Han had left off on his score. Finn had passed Hux by a hair, which explained a lot, the Rebel holding strong at 13 and Hux just behind at 14. Phasma was still doing brilliantly as usual, climbing to 11, and Ben had pulled ahead of her slightly but only to 10 by a thin margin, probably taking the expected score hit for shooting his own teammate, the only shot in the game that could decrease your score. And Rey- Rey the Rebel, Rey the raffle winner, Rey who it seemed had never played a serious game of laser tag with real pros on a real course before this day- had reached an eye-watering 5, and that only because the four players still above her were pros who had played more games for longer today, two of which already hadn't logged a couple rounds and had probably gone home. She'd catch them easily, and after that, it was only two more spots to reach the top.

Ben kept staring, unable to place the strange feeling in his chest. Usually he took his spot in the daily rankings with a grain of salt. Yes, it was motivation to keep going, keep improving, to reach the top spot as routinely as he possibly could, but ultimately legacy rankings were more important. But today, seeing Rey climbing higher and higher, taking on the whole damn building as if she had just as much a right to be there-- what was he feeling? Pride, almost? Anticipation? Suddenly he was looking forward to the round on 14 more than he could remember looking forward to anything for a long time, and looking forward to every round after that, every round she survived long enough to get into. If only she'd even consider staying at Tag Galaxy long-term! If only her total disgust for his friends didn't turn her off to the idea of being in the First Order! The way things were right now if he couldn't at least convince her to go pro then the moment the Rebellion got knocked out that would be that. She'd leave for the Falcon and he'd never see her again.

Ben looked back to the screen in time to see one of the Rebels get shot- Finn, it looked like- and hastily turned back to the stairs, not wanting to get caught in the lobby by one of them. He pulled out his phone as he went, checking the levels that weren't currently occupied. 10 was open, and as much as he hated that course he took it, sending Rey a request for a short round. He didn't even mind the training so much at the moment, he just needed a place where they could talk. He needed to convince her, if he could, to take this seriously. To take him seriously. He wasn't sure how to do it, or if he even could, but if she at least accepted the round he'd have a chance.

He'd been sitting in the member's locker room ten minutes before 13's round finally ended and the message came through. Rey had accepted the request. He was on his way to the elevators barely a moment later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Original tumblr A/N: it’s been a ~hot second y’all but I finally got a new laser tag chapter up! Trying to really hit it hard now, with Dec 19 bearing down on us and all that that implies. Ben and his struggles, lol-- who knows how it will turn out?
> 
> My tumblr:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


	11. Two offers and a warning

“Are we fighting or talking, Ben?” Rey asked, raising her eyebrows at him. They were both leaning against short barriers, their masks on but their guns loose in their hands as the game clock wound down.

“Does it matter?” Ben asked with a shrug, even though it seemed fairly obvious 'talking' was the right answer. Neither of them had let off a shot since they'd come in; somehow, he was pretty sure neither of them had thought there would be any need to. Turns out they'd both been right.

“I talked to Leia about Luke,” Rey said. “She says he's retired.”

“That's one word for it.”

“She said--,” Rey hesitated, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable, which was new. “Well, she said she doesn't know what happened, exactly, but that you broke his heart.”

“Luke is a coward and a fool,” Ben said immediately, not interested in pretending sympathy he knew for a fact he didn't feel. “There's a reason he hasn't told anyone what happened, and it's not because he's too emotional about the whole thing.”

“But you could have told Leia. And you could tell me.”

He hesitated, looking down at his gun, running a finger along the trigger guard. He wanted to, badly, and that was precisely what was so odd about this. He had the same strange, inexplicable urge from before to tell her anything, to tell her everything, but there was a fear deep in the pit of his stomach that even if he did she wouldn't believe him. That no one would believe him. A fear that, among so much that felt unfamiliar, was very, very familiar to him.

“What would you do, if you won?” he asked at last, glancing up at her. “If you got a membership here? What would you do with that?”

“Well, not this, for one thing,” she said, stretching and nodding towards the door and the rest of Tag Galaxy. “It's exhausting. But I'd want to get better, I guess. And I like playing with my friends.”

“But would you go pro?” he pressed.

“I don't know. Not alone, I don't think,” she said, looking back at him.

“You could go pro with me,” he suggested, tightening his grip on his gun to hide his surprise at himself for having said it out loud, for having thought it at all. He genuinely couldn't keep his head on straight around her; but, since it was out there, he might as well go for it. “Snoke would give you a sponsorship, I know he would,” Ben continued. “I'll talk to him if you want. He probably knows about you already.”

“A sponsorship so I can play with you?” she asked, studying him, her expression agonizingly impossible to read.

“Yes.”

“What if I don't want to play with you? Or if I'm not-- not totally sure about it, yet.”

Well, that would be the question, and one he had no good answer for. “Rey, you're better than Finn and Han and Poe,” he tried instead. “We'd be good together. And you wouldn't have to fight for it, either. You could just stay, on your own.”

“Without my friends,” she clarified.

“You don't need them.”

She thought that over for a while, which was a bit of a surprise in itself-- he'd half expected her to turn him down outright. He made himself stay silent, waiting, convinced it wouldn't be better to push her on this. She didn't seem like the kind of person that appreciated being pushed. But every second that passed without her saying anything was a strange kind of agony, and even though the levels were kept cool and they weren't even doing much of anything right now he realized he was sweating, waiting for her to speak.

“What happened with Luke?” she asked finally, the one thing he hadn't been expecting her to say.

“It doesn't matter.”

“What happened, Ben?”

“Why don't you ask him?”

“I wanted to,” she said, surprising him again, “but when I asked Leia said he wouldn't pick up the phone even if I did call. He hasn't picked up her calls either in years.”

“He tried to get me drummed out of the league. Tried to have me banned, before I even went pro.”

“Why?” she demanded, frowning, but without even a hint of the disbelief he'd expected.

“Snoke had been trying to recruit me. Luke didn't know, yet, but I think he could tell that I was off my game. He was being a lot harder on me than usual-- everything I did was wrong. I went too hard in rounds, I wasn't enough of a team player, I took more shots than I should. He started just shooting me out whenever I did something he didn't like. It was to the point where I couldn't expect to last more than a few minutes in round because Luke would shoot me out as soon as he cornered me. I got pissed.” He shrugged, frowning at the ground himself as he remembered. “We started arguing, really arguing, borderline fights-- then one day after a round, he swung at me.”

“He attacked you?!” Rey demanded, starting to her feet, gun level in both hands like she'd like to start shooting at something if only there was a target in sight.

“Yes,” Ben answered, looking up, observing this phenomenon, her outraged expression, her iron grip as the gun all but creaked in her hands. It wasn't at all what he'd expected but then he didn't know what he'd expected, really. “I didn't know what to do, so I hit back. I beat him up pretty badly. He went to the league with it, complaining that I was violent and shouldn't be allowed on pro rosters, but since it happened off the course they decided it was a personal thing and wouldn't give him the ban. Barely,” he muttered, reluctantly remembering how close it had been, how much that had stung. Because it was Luke fucking Skywalker, the best ever, golden child of the league three decades running.

“Ben...,” Rey said in a way that wrenched something in him, a way he didn't like at all.

“I knew Han and Leia weren't going to believe me,” Ben continued, cutting her off on purpose to keep her from saying whatever she was about to say. “Luke was the one covered in bruises, and I was fine. So I went to Snoke, since he was the only adult I knew outside of my own family. He gave me a sponsorship, even though I had only just gone pro, and he even gave me a place to stay. With Hux,” he added pointedly. “And Phasma joined our team later. And my parents have pretty much just acted like I don't exist anymore, until today.”

“Ben, you could have just told them,” Rey said.

“It wouldn't have been that easy, Rey. Even if they'd thought I had a point, I still beat up Luke. I shouldn't have, but....” he shrugged, not wanting to try and justify it, how Luke had caught him off guard, how he'd lashed out, how he'd been told over and over again that he didn't know his own strength and hadn't understood until he was standing over his own uncle, bloodied and on the ground. “His other students came after me on some kind of revenge high. I took them out round after round until they stopped coming. I shut them down so hard they all pretty much left pro tag completely, so far as I've heard. Since then I've pretty much just played the game.”

“Ben, if Leia knew--.”

“Leia hasn't tried to see me since I left. She knows where I am. You think she doesn't?” he said pointedly, gesturing towards the door, the lobby, where the screens would be, the rankings showing his legacy score. “Whatever Luke's been pretending went wrong, they all believe him enough that no one ever showed up on this doorstep unless it was to shoot me. I beat her brother half to death, Rey,” he added when her expression seemed to indicate she was still unconvinced. “People saw, or at least they saw what he looked like afterwards. I might not have been drummed out of the league but it sure as hell got me drummed out of my family.”

“So you're just never coming back?”

“No one wants me back.”

She hesitated at that, her eyes shadowed with indecision, taking a step towards him, across the distance separating the short barriers they'd been leaning on. “You could still try to come back if you wanted to.”

“I wouldn't know how.”

“But you could. I could help you. We could tell them together.”

“No,” he said, not so much to her as to the idea, that it could possibly be that easy, that they'd just show up and explain and everything would go back to the way it was. He'd wanted to believe that, secretly in the back of his mind at first, after it had happened, but those days were long gone.

“Ben,” she said again, just his name, taking another step closer to him. He was still sitting; at this point one more step and she'd collide with his knees.

“Come to Tag Galaxy, Rey,” he said-- pleaded, almost, which was so unlike him he wouldn't have guessed it was a gesture he was still capable of. He wouldn't have guessed a lot of today was something he was capable of, but here they were. “Or just stay. Snoke would help you, like he helped me, and I could train you. We could play in the First Order, together.” It would be so easy, he wanted to say. Everything would be so easy if I could just convince you to stay with me. But he could already tell just by looking at her that she wasn't ready to be convinced, yet, so instead he said, “We only have three more rounds. And if you don't make it to 16, it's over.”

“Unless they make us play a dueling round.”

“Rey, there's no way you'll win a dueling round,” he said, also standing, a head taller than her at least, their masks still on but their guns loose in their hands.

“Why not?”

“Because you'd be up against me,” he said, certain it was true. If by some miracle the Rebellion didn't get wiped out before then there was no chance the First Order wouldn't be the ones to join the roster against them on Starkiller, and if she was the best Rebellion player, and he was the best First Order player--.

“You wouldn't have to.”

“I'd do it anyway.” Because he'd want her to lose. Because at that point he'd have to make sure she'd lose, so that if she wanted to play at Tag Galaxy she had to do it the same way he had, and join for real. But he was distracted by that train of thought for a moment, distracted because she really was quite close to him, and behind her mask she was staring up at him, and he had the insane urge to take hers off, to take his off, to get closer to her while still safe in the knowledge that there were no cameras on in short rounds--.

The round timer went off and they both jumped, stepping apart again, as though they didn't want to get caught as close together as they had been even though they hadn't technically been doing anything wrong. Ben turned to Rey, intending to say something more but her head was down as she fiddled with the straps of her chestplate, adjusting one. “We should go,” she said, not looking up.

“What are you going to do if we knock you out on 14?” Ben asked, following as she headed for the door, doffing her helmet.

“Go back to Millennium Falcon.”

“That's it? That's all?”

“I want to play with my friends,” she insisted, rounding on him as he pulled his own helmet off, catching him off guard. He stumbled to a halt just shy of her, stepping back again. “I want to go pro with them, and not with some corporate tag chain that just wants to make money off of me.”

“Fine.”

“Fine,” she agreed, turning towards the exit again. He watched her go, wanting to follow but knowing for certain that if he did he'd say something insane, something he definitely wouldn't have planned to and wouldn't know what to do with once it was out, because that was what seemed to happen when he was around her. A round ago he hadn't been able to figure out why he'd even told her his real name; now he'd practically given up his whole life story for the asking, and had even suspected he would going in, and somehow it almost seemed like that was fine since it was her. He hadn't even told Phasma about his life before Tag Galaxy, and she was a teammate he'd been playing with for years and years. Rey was not only a stranger, she was a stranger who knew his family and was close enough with them to just call them up on the phone, or drop their names in conversation like it was nothing. He hadn't said Luke's name in he didn't know how long before today, hadn't even heard Han's or Leia's. This girl was trouble, but some kind of trouble he didn't seem to be able to shake, even in his own head.

He waited until he was sure she'd be either on the elevator or the stairs back down the to public lobby before he followed, taking his time on his way through the empty course so he could try and think, running a hand through his hair, as damp with sweat as if he'd just played a round rather than spending the whole time talking. What would he have done if their masks weren't in the way? He was almost afraid to think it but the thought kept coming around anyway, distracting him, pulling his attention back to that moment until he was almost unaware that he was leaving the level, brushing past the bored trooper at the entrance and nearly making it all the way to the elevator before he realized there was someone familiar waiting for him.

“Short round,” Hux said, looking back at 10. It wasn't a question but Ben answered it anyway.

“Yes.”

“Did the girl have a lot to say to you? Updates from home? How is Millennium Falcon doing these days? How's Luke?”

“I want her to join us.”

That pulled Hux up short, distracting him from whatever vicious tirade he'd had planned as he was forced to process this new information. “Her?” he finally sneered, falling back on his usual disdain in the absence of any real response. “The Rebel girl?”

“She's good.”

“She's a casual. She never played a pro round before today in her life!” Hux snapped, working into more of a fury as he saw Ren was serious. “We don't need someone like her on the First Order roster!”

“Why?” Ben asked, stepping in it deliberately, hardly caring. “Because she's better than you?”

The silence that followed was deafening. Hux stared, his mouth one thin, hard line, hands locked into fists at his sides, and for a moment, just one brief but no less painful moment, Ben wondered if Hux would hit him. Instead he only stepped toward Ben, eyes narrowing hatefully.

“I've been wondering about 12,” he said, so unexpectedly that it made Ben blink. “Your little comment about my second gun. I didn't take that gun out until the end of the round. Where were you at the end of that round, Ren? Going after the traitor, like you were supposed to?”

“I'd already taken both the traitor and Poe out by then. I shot them myself in the time it took you to fail to get Rey.”

“Yes, you had. I know you had, because I went down to the desk and asked them to check the gun logs. You know who else you took out, _Kylo Ren_?” Hux hissed, his tone savage, his expression pure venom. “Right before I got the Rebel girl, you shot me.”

Ben had nothing to say to that. He was caught and they both knew it, and while Hux shouldn't have had that second gun it was still a flimsy excuse for shooting your own teammate on any day, but especially in circumstances like these. Hux stared him down, his vicious streak on full display in his eyes, in the tight way he held himself, in the hard slash of his mouth, and for once Ben was forced to wonder who would win in a physical fight between them. He hadn't physically hit anyone since Luke, and hadn't intended to, but if Hux went for him in a mood like this he had no idea what would happen next.

“You better watch your back on 14, _Ben Solo_,” Hux finally said, stepping away, punching the button for the Member's locker room. “Because even if the First Order plays you're not going to have any friends on that course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This is the last Tag Galaxy chapter I had started before TROS came out but I honestly don’t think it’ll make that much of a difference. I pretty much had the plot in mind in broad strokes, so I think the story will be much the same. There may be some ~themes~ that make it in (see if you can spot the one that already has!) but overall we’ll be headed the same way we have been :)

**Author's Note:**

> If you're also reading 'The Rebel's Last Stand', no worries!! I'm still working on that one and regularly updating it. I'm just doing this one also. Each will get its fair share of love!
> 
> My tumblr, you know the drill:
> 
> https://how-do-i-turn-this-thing-off.tumblr.com/


End file.
